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Asked by Joe to Rebecca, Laura, Andrew on 19 Nov 2014.
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Laura Schofield answered on 19 Nov 2014:
In some things yes. But then UKIP have stood up and said we should leave Europe (which I personally disagree with) and everyone is up in arms about that! I don’t think there is a perfect government that will please everyone so I can see why they are afraid to stand up and say what they think. I think science is quite poorly represented in the government so that makes it difficult for them to make decisions on science. I feel they need to be better advised before they can stand up and be counted!
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Rebecca Ingle answered on 19 Nov 2014:
It depends on whether you think government should be influenced by public opinion or whether policies and ideas should be based off the results of studies and statistics.
I definitely do think there are times when the government is to swayed by trying to appeal to popular opinion rather than looking at objective facts and I think it can lead to very short sighted decisions.
Just to add on to Laura’s point, leaving Europe would definitely be terrible for science in the UK, not just because it makes it easy for talented researchers to work here but simply because the EU puts so much funding into science and work based here, which I’m really not sure we could afford without it.
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Andrew McKinley answered on 19 Nov 2014:
The government are in a completely impossible position – and that applies to any government. It is impossible to please all the people all the time. It is hard enough doing it with a class of 100 students – imagine doing it with a population of 65 million people! Consequently they have to make sure they do not upset people and sometimes that means not standing from the crowd.
So, what they do is to have policies which they believe enough of the population will support enough to vote, and try to minimise controversy (topics which people might not like) which will have people actively voting against them. As with all things, it is a balance.
Unfortunately, when a government starts to enact these policies, there are unintended consequences, which start to upset the people that voted for them, and as a result they lose voters, and you will get a new government next time. And then the whole cycle begins again…
I think that, for the most part, our politicians are largely selfless – it is a largely thankless job where you are almost guaranteed to upset people and become a disliked person, and the money – while not bad at all! – isn’t really enough to justify the treatment you get from the population.
I’m not saying that I like all of the government’s policies, and I’m not saying that any other government would be better or worse, but I do appreciate the impossible nature of their job!
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