Nationally, the UK could do with more innovation. After all, we’ve had next to no productivity growth since 2008, which partly explains why we haven’t had a pay rise either. Big regional productivity gaps, which have been with us for decades, also lie behind the government’s “levelling-up” agenda.
With London, the south-east and east accounting for 52% of total R&D spending, government has been under pressure to be transparent about how much public innovation support different regions receive. Some propose new universities, or proper endowments for existing ones, in the north of England. A new paper offers support for the idea that such institutions make a real difference to innovation.
In the mid-1990s, the Swiss government established universities of applied sciences, with technical researchers working closely with business. The institutions increased both the quantity of regional innovation (patent numbers rose by 6.8%) and its quality (lots of patents are rubbish, so this is as important). For those who fear this was because the Swiss have strong local economies, the researchers found positive effects even outside bigger, already successful cities.
So institutions matter, but don’t get too excited. Patenting is only part of the innovation jigsaw. And innovation is only one part of the even harder productivity jigsaw, where our skills, how well our firms are run and how easy it is to trade with the rest of the world all matter. There is no “levelling-up” magic bullet.
Torsten Bell is chief executive of the Resolution Foundation. Read more at resolutionfoundation.org
