EU R&D
Amidst all of the recent argument about the EU's budget, I found this BBC chart interesting ....
.... the EU spends more on administration than on research, and less than either Microsoft or IBM spend on research. I am by no stretch of the imagination Blairite, but I am applaud his recent speech to the European Parliament in which he said
" ... what type of social model is it that has 20m unemployed in Europe, productivity rates falling behind those of the USA; that is allowing more science graduates to be produced by India than by Europe; and that, on any relative index of a modern economy - skills, R&D, patents, IT, is going down not up. India will expand its biotechnology sector fivefold in the next five years. China has trebled its spending on R&D in the last five.
Of the top 20 universities in the world today, only two are now in Europe. "
(My emphasis)
This is the technology policy agenda enlightened European leaders are engaged in, and I hear it regularly across Eastern Europe when I meet with technology policy makers. The sooner it is heard more in Brussels the better.