2024 General Election analysis: Where do UK political parties stand on the big chemistry issues?

Funding and landscape

• Enable the UK to be a leading G7 country in R&D investment and aim to be among the top science and innovation nations globally.
• Provide clarity on long-term investment plans. Once the Government has achieved its commitment to invest £20 billion per year on R&D by 2024/25, this should increase to £22 billion per year by 2026/27, in line with previous commitments.
• Create a stable R&D policy environment to boost confidence in the UK for public and private investors, and high-skilled workers, to locate their lives and businesses in the country.
• Ensure that increased investment and support are felt across all regions and nations of the UK and support a science culture that prioritises good scientific practice and individual wellbeing, as well as heightening participation in science and innovation.
• Support UK researchers and businesses to make the most of Horizon Europe participation and ensure any underspend is ringfenced for R&D.

Talent and workforce

• Attract the best-talented researchers and innovators through an internationally competitive visa scheme and ensure the UK workforce is equipped with skills to tackle the health and sustainability challenges of our time and to make the most of the opportunities and manage the risks that new technologies present in the chemistry sector.
• Implement an immigration system that supports R&D activity in the UK to enable economic growth. It must be flexible, affordable, and welcoming. 
• Increase provision of skills required for green jobs in the future via an updated curriculum to avoid a potential knowledge gap.
• Work with leaders in diversity and inclusion and organisations in the research landscape to ensure that policy levers and organisational practice make a step change in diversity in R&D environments.

Ecosystem and resources

• Address the critical shortage of laboratory facilities in the UK, ensuring chemical scientists can access appropriate laboratory space across the country.
• Mandate sustainable laboratory practices that are realistic, ambitious and embed sustainability in organisational culture.
• Increase financial support for innovative R&D-driven SMEs, particularly at the scale-up stage to maximise economic growth and allow for SMEs to thrive.

Funding and landscape

• Increase public spending on R&D to £22 billion a year, up from £20 billion this year.
• Continue investing over £1.5 billion in large-scale compute clusters.
• Use our significant investment in R&D to prioritise cutting-edge technology in areas such as fertiliser and vertical farming.
• Close university courses in England with the worst outcomes for their students. Courses that have excessive drop-out rates or leave students worse off than had they not gone to university will be prevented from recruiting students by the universities regulator, the Office for Students.

Talent and workforce

• Raise the Skilled Worker threshold and Family income requirement with inflation automatically to make sure they don’t undercut UK workers.
• Increase all visa fees and remove the student discount to the Immigration Health Surcharge to raise more money for public services.

Ecosystems and resources

• Improve access to finance for SMEs including through expanding Open Finance and by exploring the creation of Regional Mutual Banks.
• Work with public sector organisations to ensure that procurement opportunities are focused on SMEs in their local economies where possible and practical.
• Maintain our R&D tax reliefs. Recent changes worth £280 million a year have simplified and improved R&D tax reliefs, including by bringing more SMEs into the scope of the relief.

Funding and landscape

• Invest £12.4bn in skills and training, equipping workers to play a full role in the green economy.
• Push for the UK to re-join the EU as soon as the political conditions are right
• Seek to increase investment into research and development by over £30bn in the lifetime of the five-year parliament.
• Push the UK government to partner with universities, other research institutions and business to assess the most economically and environmentally significant areas for research and development.

Talent and workforce

• Put an end to the minimum income requirements for spouses of those holding work visas.

Ecosystems and resources

• Set up regional mutual banks to drive investment in decarbonisation and local economic sustainability.

Funding and landscape

• Scrap short funding cycles for key R&D institutions in favour of 10-year budgets that allow meaningful partnerships with industry to keep the UK at the forefront of global innovation.
• Ensure start-ups have the access to finance.
• Create a new Regulatory Innovation Office, bringing together existing functions across government. This office will help regulators update regulation, speed up approval timelines, and co-ordinate issues that span existing boundaries.
• End short-term economic policy-making with the establishment of an Industrial Strategy Council, on a statutory footing, to provide expert advice.

Talent and workforce

• Strengthen the Migration Advisory Committee, and establish a framework for joint working with skills bodies across the UK, the Industrial Strategy Council and the Department for Work and Pensions. Skills England will formally work with the Migration Advisory Committee to make sure training in England accounts for the overall needs of the labour market.
• Reform the points-based immigration system so that it is fair and properly managed, with appropriate restrictions on visas, and by linking immigration and skills policy.
• Create a flexible Growth and Skills Levy, with Skills England consulting on eligible courses to ensure qualifications offer value for money.
• Support the aspiration of every person who meets the requirements and wants to go to university.
• Create a secure future for higher education and the opportunities it creates across the UK. 
• Adopt more joined-up thinking, ensuring that migration to address skills shortages triggers a plan to upskill workers and improve working conditions in the UK.
• Establish a Green Prosperity Plan where, in partnership with business through our National Wealth Fund, we will invest in the industries of the future.

Ecosystems and resources

• Reform the British Business Bank, including a stronger mandate to support growth in the regions and nations, will make it easier for small and medium-sized enterprises to access capital.
• Encourage local leaders work with major employers, universities, colleges, and industry bodies to produce long-term plans that identify growth sectors and put in place the programmes and infrastructure they need to thrive. These will align with our national industrial strategy.

Funding and landscape

• Support science, research and innovation, particularly among small businesses and startups, in universities and in zero-carbon, environmental and medical technologies, including by:
• Continue to participate in Horizon Europe and join the European Innovation Council.
• Aim for at least 3% of GDP to be invested in research and development by 2030, rising to 3.5% by 2034. 
• Return to the Erasmus Plus programme as an associated country
• Repair the broken relationship with Europe, which acts as a brake on the economy and costs the UK investment, jobs and tax revenue.
• Power scale-up companies, especially outside of London and the South East, using innovative ways of ‘crowding-in’ private sector investment.

Talent and workforce

• Fix the work visa system and expand the Youth Mobility Scheme to help address labour shortages. 
• Report international student flows separately to estimates of long-term migration.
• Replace the current salary threshold with a more flexible merit-based system for work visas, with the relevant department working with employers in each sector to address specific needs as part of a long-term workforce strategy that also focuses on education and training to address skills gaps from within the UK.
• Overhaul the immigration rules to make them simpler, clearer and fairer, and ensure greater parliamentary scrutiny of future changes.
• Extend the participation of devolved administrations in the development of the evidence base for UK-wide policy on work permits and student visas, helping ensure rules are sensitive to the skills needs of every corner of the UK and every sector of the economy.

Ecosystems and resources

• Introduce a 4% tax on the share buyback schemes of FTSE-100 listed companies, to incentivise productive investment, job creation and economic growth.

Funding and landscape

• Raise concerns about the higher education sector, warning that it is in crisis and in need of urgent support.
• Increase government investment in research and development.
• Make university education free again for all, and we will work with universities to develop a plan to make them financially viable.

Talent and workforce

• Retain the current number of UK and overseas students, which will result in a net increase of overall students.

Ecosystems and resources

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about the wider R&D ecosystem or possible changes to it.

Funding and landscape

• Re-entry to the Erasmus+ scheme
• Maintain free university tuition for students in Scotland

Talent and workforce

• Access to workers from across the EU, enabling many of our industries to grow.
• Freedom of movement to live, visit, study and work freely in any EU country.
• Devolve powers to create a bespoke migration system for Scotland that values those who decide to work, live, study and invest here and allows us to address our specific demographic and economic needs.

Ecosystems and resources

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about the wider R&D ecosystem or possible changes to it.

We are pleased to see R&D spending and infrastructure remain an important priority across all political parties. However, to maximise the benefits created by R&D, the next government must provide clarity on long-term investment plans.

We welcome funding commitments made by the Greens, Liberal Democrats, Conservatives and Labour but we must reiterate the importance of a stable policy environment to allow public and private investors to feel confident to invest in R&D businesses.

International collaboration is the key to good science and innovation. We must support researchers and enable them to make the most of Horizon Europe participation and would like to see political parties across the spectrum promote this more. To do so, we must implement an immigration system that is flexible and affordable and supports R&D activity in the UK.  

We welcome the ecosystems of SMEs featuring in several of the manifestos we have analysed. However it is important to stress that the policy environment must allow chemistry-intensive SMEs to thrive in all regions of the UK through access to funding, lab facilities and local networks of research-driven businesses. After all, research-driven 'deep tech' SMEs are creating technologies that can both solve global challenges and drive UK economic growth. 

The next government must also provide the sector with further reassurances on other key issues not raised in manifestos, such as access to laboratory facilities and the financial sustainability of universities.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

• Reform the curriculum to ensure it is fit-for-purpose, engaging and relevant, while avoiding content overload; it should provide young people with skills and understanding that enables them to become scientifically literate citizens, and that prepares them for further study and/or careers in the chemical sciences.
• Prepare all young people to fully participate in efforts to tackle climate change and sustainability challenges.
• Include relevant and regular practical chemistry activities which are sustainable, inclusive, accessible and have a clear purpose, and whose consumables and equipment are sufficiently funded.
• Foster a sense of identity and belonging in the chemical sciences through better use of contexts, examples and role models; students see that a future in chemistry is ‘for people like me’.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

• Equip students with core chemistry knowledge and skills that are understood and valued by employers, via both academic and vocational options at level 3 and above.
• Adopt a ‘single route’ science qualification to the age of 16, giving learners equal opportunity to study science by addressing existing gatekeeping and perception problems.
• Broaden children’s horizons and ambitions by ensuring they understand the wide range of careers and opportunities that science enables.
• Teachers and careers professionals are confident to talk about the full range of academic and vocational routes to those careers.

An empowered expert workforce

• Ensure teachers and technicians have the resources, skills, expertise and motivation so that all students have access to an excellent chemistry education.
• Address the teacher recruitment and retention crisis with long-term solutions that can withstand population and economic fluctuations.
• Invest in high-quality, subject-specific professional development for teachers.
• Address the shortage of school science technicians through improvements in conditions and pay.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about the curriculum or possible changes to it.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

• Transform 16-19 education by introducing the Advanced British Standard, enabling young people to receive a broader education and removing the artificial divide between academic and technical learning.
• Create 100,000 more apprenticeships in England every year by the end of the next Parliament.

An empowered expert workforce

• We will attract more talented teachers by expanding our recruitment and retention premium and reducing workload. 
• From this September, new teachers in priority areas and key STEM and technical subjects will receive bonuses of up to £30,000 tax-free over five years. We will extend the payments to eligible teachers in our further education colleges.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

• Ensure effective delivery of the new Natural History GCSE.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

• Provide support for every higher education student, with the restoration of grants and the end of tuition fees.

An empowered expert workforce

• An increase in school funding of £8bn, to include £2bn for a pay uplift for teachers.
• Reduce the stress in our education system by ending high-stakes, formal testing at primary and secondary schools and by abolishing OFSTED.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

• Build on the hard work of teachers who have brought their subjects alive with knowledge-rich syllabuses, to deliver a curriculum which is rich and broad, inclusive, and innovative.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

• Will establish a youth guarantee of access to training, an apprenticeship, or support to find work for all 18- to 21-year-olds,
• Reform Apprenticeships Levy.
• Encourage Skills England to co-ordinate between local areas to ensure everyone can access all the opportunities available.
• Transform Further Education colleges into specialist Technical Excellence Colleges.
• Address skills shortages by bringing forward a comprehensive strategy for post-16 education, and guarantee training, an apprenticeship, or help to find work for all 18-to-21-year olds.

An empowered expert workforce

• Introduce new Regional Improvement Teams, to enhance school-to-school support, and spread best practice
• Create a new Excellence in Leadership Programme, a mentoring framework that expands the capacity of headteachers and leaders to improve their schools.
• Reinstate the School Support Staff Negotiating Body, which will help address the acute recruitment and retention crisis in support roles.
• Recruit an additional 6,500 new expert teachers.
• Get more teachers into shortage subjects, support areas that face recruitment challenges, and tackle retention issues.
• Update the Early Career Framework, maintaining its grounding in evidence, and ensure any new teacher entering the classroom has, or is working towards, Qualified Teacher Status.
• Introduce a new Teacher Training Entitlement to ensure teachers stay up to date on best practice with continuing professional development.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

• Urgently establish a standing commission to build a long-term consensus across parties and teachers to broaden the curriculum and make qualifications at 16 and 18 fit for the 21st century.
• Develop National Colleges as national centres of expertise for key sectors, such as renewable energy, to deliver the high-level vocational skills that businesses need.
• Invest in green infrastructure, innovation and skills to boost economic growth and create good jobs and prosperity in every nation and region of the UK, while tackling the climate crisis.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

• Replace the broken apprenticeship levy with a broader and more flexible skills and training levy. Investing in education and training to equip people with the skills needed for the low-carbon economy of the future. 
• Boost the take-up of apprenticeships, including by guaranteeing they are paid at least the National Minimum Wage by scrapping the lower apprentice rate
• Create new Lifelong Skills Grants for adults to spend on education and training throughout their lives.
• Identify and seek to solve skills gaps, such as the lack of advanced technicians, by expanding higher vocational training like foundation degrees, Higher National Diplomas, Higher National Certificates and Higher Apprenticeships.
• Improve the quality of vocational education and strengthening careers advice and links with employers in schools and colleges.
• Strengthen careers advice and links with employers in schools and colleges.

An empowered expert workforce

• Create a teacher workforce strategy to ensure that every secondary school child is taught by a specialist teacher in their subject. 
• Reform the School Teachers’ Review Body to make it properly independent of government and able to recommend fair pay rises for teachers, and fully funding those rises every year.
• Fund teacher training properly so that all trainee posts in school are paid.
• Introduce a clear and properly funded programme of high-quality professional development for all teachers, including training on effective parental engagement.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

• Review the implementation of the new Curriculum for Wales and the Additional Learning Needs Act is essential, to ensure consistency in terms of the education and support learners receive.
• Ensure the school curriculum equips young people with an understanding of climate challenges and encourages a philosophy of engaging with climate change and the natural world.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

• Make tuition and maintenance loans at Levels 4, 5 and 6, including for vocational qualifications, available to all adults aged 18 or over, and available in both further and higher education.
• Place vocational education on the same foundations as academic learning in school and university.

An empowered expert workforce

• Ensure schools are resourced to provide both the education and support our learners require in order to leave education equipped for their futures.
• Invest in our workforce, ensuring both teachers and support staff are supported and valued in order to improve both recruitment and retention by:
  • Reviewing all bursary schemes available to incentivise teachers, to ensure they attract applicants and help to fill recruitment gaps.
  • Working with the teaching unions to reduce bureaucracy and workload.
  • Recruiting and retaining 5,000 teachers and support staff.
  • Conducting a review of Initial Teacher Education and Continuing Professional Development to ascertain their relevance to the demands of the new curriculum.
  • Appointing more non-teaching staff to deal with pupil needs beyond education.
  • Developing a more attractive and formalised role for teaching assistants who currently do not have a clear career pathway.

A relevant and adequately resourced curriculum

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about the curriculum or possible changes to it.

Accessible routes and equal pathways

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about equal pathways or accessible routes.

An empowered expert workforce

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about possible changes that affect the workforce.

In line with our asks, the next government must reform the curriculum to ensure it is fit for purpose, engaging and relevant while avoiding content overload. We look forward to seeing more details from whoever wins the next election on how and when they will implement such changes. 

An empowered teaching workforce is key to achieving high-quality STEM education in the UK. The next Government must urgently address the teacher recruitment and retention crisis with long-term solutions that can withstand population and economic fluctuations.

Alongside this, skills and the need for addressing any potential skills gaps are referenced by all political parties. We want teachers and careers professionals to have access to the support they need to ensure they are confident to talk about the full range of academic and vocational routes available to students.

Investment in high-quality, professional development for teachers is needed to support the delivery of an inspiring chemistry education and to develop relevant knowledge and skills.

We are surprised that some political parties failed to mention the importance of practical activities in science education and the role science technicians play in facilitating this. We want the next government to review school science technicians' pay and conditions to allow for relevant and regular practical chemistry activities which are sustainable, inclusive, accessible and have a clear purpose.

The curriculum should provide young people with skills and understanding, enabling them to become scientifically literate citizens and preparing them for further study and/or careers in the chemical sciences.

As part of this reform, we would encourage the next government to adopt a ‘single route’ science qualification to the age of 16, giving learners equal opportunity to study science by addressing existing gatekeeping and perception problems.

Chemicals Strategy and management

• Give a timeframe for the release of the long-awaited chemicals strategy.
• Provide necessary bespoke training and upskilling of regulatory professionals to deliver high-quality regulatory regimes for chemicals.
• Set up a national chemicals regulation approach to provide better strategic coordination of monitoring and regulation for all chemicals.
• Improve the quality of drinking water by lowering safe thresholds for PFAS in drinking water, maintaining a national inventory, and imposing stricter limits on PFAS discharges.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

• Continue to support UK leadership in UNEP’s work in the global framework for chemicals (GFC) and the process of developing the UN Science Policy Panel (SPP) on chemicals, waste and pollution prevention.
• Show leadership on the global pollution and waste crisis driven by excessive use of problematic, unnecessary and avoidable plastics, by continuing to engage with the international plastics treaty process, and acting decisively in the UK to enable a circular economy of plastic.
• Strengthen research and development efforts into long-term monitoring programmes and measurement technologies that increase our understanding of the impacts of indoor and outdoor air quality.
• Continue commitment to international collaborations regarding antimicrobial resistance (AMR) research and surveillance programmes, and to maintain a strong science base to enable a comprehensive approach to AMR.

Circular economy

• Develop policies that support the transition to a circular materials economy, including investment in a domestic recycling infrastructure.
• Incentivise resource-efficient design and production alongside assessments of criticality and substitutability of materials.
• Map and track critical mineral streams and regularly assess the criticality of minerals and other raw materials, taking into account the needs of different sectors.
• Support a moratorium on commercial exploitation of minerals through deep seabed mining whilst work continues to understand its impacts.

Chemicals Strategy and management

• Work with the regulator to further hold companies to account, including banning executive bonuses if a company has committed a serious criminal breach. This will build on our legislation for unlimited fines.
• Extend the £50 water rebate for those in the South West across the Parliament.
• Use fines from water companies to invest in river restoration projects, including linking up thriving habitats to multiply the benefits for wildlife and water quality
• Reform the ‘Price Review’ regulatory process for water companies. This will consider how we move to a more localised catchment-based and outcome-focused approach, that better utilises nature-based solutions and further strengthens sanctions for water companies that fail to deliver for the public, coasts and rivers.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

No new pledges were made in the manifesto regarding international cooperation or leadership on chemicals.

Circular economy

• Continue to develop UK-wide Deposit Return Scheme, while working to minimise the impact on businesses and consumers.
• Continue with our moratorium on deep sea mining and will ratify the Global Oceans Treaty early in the next Parliament.
• Invest £1.1 billion into the Green Industries Growth Accelerator to support British manufacturing capabilities, boost supply chains and ensure our energy transition is made in Britain.
• No new green levies.
• Give the Environment Agency clearer objectives to focus on.

Chemicals Strategy and management

• Bring the railways, water companies and the Big 5 retail energy companies into public ownership.
• Push for improvements in biodiversity and soil health, leading to cleaner rivers.
• Link farm payments to reduced use of pesticides and other agro-chemicals.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

• Implement A new Clean Air (Human Rights) Act, giving everyone the right to breathe clean air.
• Invest £40bn per year in the shift to a green economy over the course of the next Parliament.
• Implement a carbon tax to drive fossil fuels out of our economy and raise money to invest in the green transition.

Circular economy

• Increase the scope of bans on the production of single-use plastics for use in packaging.
• Advocate for a circular economy that reduces the waste of resources.
• Require manufacturers to offer 10-year warranties on white goods, to encourage repair and reuse.
• Introduce a comprehensive ‘right to repair’, so manufacturers keep goods operational years after purchase.

Chemicals Strategy and management

• Give regulators new powers to block the payment of bonuses to executives who pollute our waterways & ensure independent monitoring of every outlet.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

• Create a new Clean Power Alliance, bringing together a coalition of countries at the cutting edge of climate action.
• Restore the strong global leadership needed to tackle the climate crisis.

Circular economy

• Commit to reducing waste by moving to a circular economy. 
• Invest £1.8 billion to upgrade ports and build supply chains across the UK.

Chemicals Strategy and management

• Ensure the UK has the highest possible standards of environmental, health, labour and consumer protection, at least matching EU standards.
• Launch an ambitious industrial strategy to incentivise businesses to invest and create good jobs across the UK.
• Introduce a ‘blue corridor’ programme for rivers, streams and lakes to ensure clean and healthy water and set new ‘blue flag’ standards.
• Re-establish the Industrial Strategy Council and put it on a statutory footing, to ensure vital oversight, monitoring and evaluation of the industrial strategy for the long term. 
• Improve the quantity and quality of bathing waters and sensitive nature sites with more regular and robust testing of water quality
• Appoint a cross-departmental Minister for Rural Communities, to make sure that rural voices are heard across government.
• Strengthen the Office for Environmental Protection and provide more funding to the Environment Agency and Natural England to help protect our environment and enforce environmental laws.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

• Remain committed to delivering the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in the UK and around the world.
• Restore international development spending to 0.7% of national income, with tackling climate change a key priority for development spending.
• Work together with our European neighbours to tackle the nature crisis, including applying to join the European Environment Agency.
• Work to protect 30% of the world’s oceans by 2030 through the UN High Seas Treaty and finalising a Global Plastics Treaty to cut plastic pollution worldwide.
• Set an ambition of ending plastic waste exports by 2030.
• Meet the UK’s commitment under the Paris Agreement to reduce emissions by at least 68% from 1990 levels by 2030.
• Pass a Clean Air Act, based on World Health Organization guidelines, enforced by a new Air Quality Agency.

Circular economy

• Cut resource use, waste and pollution by accelerating the transition to a more circular economy that maximises the recovery, reuse, recycling and remanufacturing of products. This will cut costs for consumers and businesses, reduce exposure to volatile commodity prices, protect the environment and create new jobs and enterprises.
• Create a nature-positive economy, tackle plastic pollution and waste, and get Britain recycling by:
  • Introducing a deposit return scheme for food and drink bottles and containers, working with the devolved administrations to ensure consistency across the UK, learning the lessons from the difficulties with the Scottish scheme.
  • Aiming for the complete elimination of non-recyclable single-use plastics within three years and replacing them with affordable alternatives.

Chemicals Strategy and management

• Fully align the Senedd’s legislative competence over water with the geographical boundary of Wales.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

• Support clear air zones near major centres of population, and traffic calming measures to increase road safety.
• Support a science-led plan aligned with the 2022 Kunming-Montreal agreement to ensure that nature loss is firmly in reverse as soon as possible.

Circular economy

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about circular economy itself.

Chemicals Strategy and management

No new pledges were made in the manifesto about the curriculum or possible changes to it.

International cooperation and leadership on chemicals

• Establish a Four Nations Climate Response Group to agree on climate plans across the UK that deliver on our net-zero targets and ensure the UK Government stops backtracking on climate ambition.

Circular economy

• Call for the UK Government must invest at least £28bn a year in the green economy to deliver a step change in public and private investment in net zero and major investment in the domestic supply chain.
• Westminster must ensure fair funding flows to devolved nations to enable our, and their, climate ambition given that for the whole of the UK to reach net zero by 2050, Scotland must do so by 2045.
• Propose devolution of new borrowing powers to invest in the net zero transition and that the new UK Government match the £500m Just Transition Fund for the North East and Moray.

We welcome continued commitment to the UK's climate targets and a transition to clean energy. Moving to a circular materials economy will not only reduce waste and pollution, but also help meet the significant material demands of these ambitions (including in terms of scaling up wind power, be that offshore or onshore).

We would therefore strongly urge the new government to develop and deliver a strategy for a circular economy of materials which covers not only critical minerals but also steel, cement, plastics and other materials required for key technologies and sectors.

The next government needs to show leadership in multilateral efforts to address the most pressing issues in health and the environment, including the UN SPP for chemicals, waste and pollution prevention; the Global Framework on Chemicals; the international plastics treaty; and AMR research and surveillance.

We note that there is little emphasis in any of the manifestos on the central role chemicals play in our economy. A new government should accelerate the development of a chemicals strategy for the whole of the UK and consider setting up a national Chemicals Agency to drive a more streamlined, coherent and effective regulatory framework for chemicals. This will help protect human health and the environment, drive innovation and economic growth, and deliver taxpayer value for money.

While we support ambitions to reduce pollution of our waterways and coasts, we would urge a new government to ensure that the pollution prevention principle remains central to any clean water strategy, and that the costs of pollution control is borne by those who cause the pollution. Effective and adequately resourced monitoring strategies looking for trends of chemicals in water, humans, air, soil and wildlife will be critical for ensuring protection of our environment and human health.

We also urge government to regulate and legislate to ensure best practices for chemicals of concern to ensure we achieve a clean and sustainable supply of water for all. This includes stronger regulatory controls of hazardous PFAS levels in drinking water.

The RSC has long been a trusted source of scientific expertise and we promote evidence-based policy. We will continue to work with all political stakeholders on behalf of our community to ensure the best outcomes for the chemical sciences.