U.K. Initiates Formal Consultation on Scientific Advice

The Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor David Beddington, has opened a formal consultation on “Guidelines on Scientific Analysis in Policy Making.”  (H/T Times Online’s Eureka Zone)  While no doubt prompted, or at least accelerated, due to the sacking of Professor Nutt, this consultation is a followup to previous consultations started in 1997 by Professor Beddington’s predecessor, Sir David King.  It is not a specific inquiry about the propriety of Home Secretary Johnson’s sacking of Professor Nutt.  While earlier press reports suggested this was taking place, it is apparently not as public a process as this consultation (which makes no reference to the sacking).

The consultation would be comparable to a request for comment in the United States.  Pages 9-11 of the consultation document list the questions at issue, and comments will be accepted until early February 2010.  The current guidelines (which are government wide, some agencies have guidelines specific to their advisory groups) are included in that document.  The Times and the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills suggest that this is being done in connection with efforts of the science minister, Lord Drayson, to hammer out principles for scientific advice with prominent scientists.  Some joint statement by Professor Beddington and Lord Drayson on those principles is expected by the end of the year, and those principles will be included as part of the consultation.  Whether or not the Government, via Home Secretary Johnson or Professor Beddington, will say anything more on Professor Nutt’s sacking, and when any statement might take place, is unclear.

Nutt Fully Embraces Policy Advocacy

There’s an interesting sideline in the aftermath of Professor Nutt’s sacking as the chair of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs.  Apparently he’s been developing synthetic alcohol and thinks the Scottish government should consider it to combat their alcohol problems.  From the Daily Record:

“The Scottish government is now beginning to talk sensibly about intervening with alcohol and minimum pricing and I think they should say ‘We want an alcohol substitute’.

“‘We want to encourage people to make one and if it’s good we will allow it to be used and price it the same as alcohol’.

“This new approach is designed to do three things.

“The first is to allow an antidote for people with alcohol poisoning, the second is to stop the liver, heart, gut and brain damage and the third is to get rid of the dependence-producing qualities.”

He’s not talking completely out of his hat here.  This undated (I’m guessing from 2006) article on synthehol (thank Star Trek: The Next Generation for that term) from How Stuff Works notes Dr. Nutt’s work in this area and suggests that 24th century science fiction could become 21st century science.