Minister of State for Science, Research and Innovation
Responsibilities
The Minister of State for Science, Research and Innovation is responsible for:
- Domestic science and research ecosystem, including Public Sector Research Establishments (PSREs)
- International science and research, including space science
- Horizon Europe
- R&D
- Life sciences
- Quantum, engineering biology and semiconductors
- Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA)
- Government Office for Technology Transfer (GOTT)
- UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)
- Tech and innovation across the missions
- Regulatory Innovation Office
Current role holder
Lord Vallance
Lord Vallance KCB FRS FMedSci FRCP HonFREng was appointed Minister of State (Minister for Science) on 5 July 2024.
He was previously Government Chief Scientific Adviser (GCSA) from April 2018 to April 2023. He was also National Technology Adviser (NTA) and Head of the Government Science and Engineering (GSE) Profession.
Lord Vallance KCB FRS FMedSci FRCP HonFREng was President, R&D at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) from 2012 until 2017. Prior to this, he was Senior Vice President, Medicines Discovery and Development. He joined the company in May 2006 as Head of Drug Discovery. He was a member of the GSK Board and the Corporate Executive Team. During his period as head of R&D, many new medicines were approved for use worldwide, for diseases ranging from cancer and rare diseases in children, to asthma and HIV.
Prior to joining GSK, he was a clinical academic, Professor of Medicine and led the Division of Medicine at UCL. He has many years’ experience of basic science and clinical research, and was a consultant physician in the NHS. His research spanned from work on medicinal chemistry and structural biology, through to cellular work, studies in humans and use of large electronic health record databases.
He was elected to the Academy of Medical Sciences in 1999 and to the Royal Society in 2017. He was on the Board of the UK Office for Strategic Co-ordination of Health Research (OSCHR) from 2009 to 2016. He is an Honorary Fellow at UCL and holds honorary degrees from Imperial College London, Glasgow University, University of York and St George’s, University of London. He was a non-executive director and board member for UK Biobank and a non-executive board member for Genome Research Limited but stepped down in taking up the GCSA role.