Policy@Manchester Articles

Expert insight, analysis and comment on key public policy issues

  • All Posts
  • UK Politics
  • Energy and Environment
  • Growth and Inclusion
  • Health and Social Care
  • Urban
  • Science and Engineering
Policy@Manchester Articles: Science and Technology
You are here: Home / Archives for Science and Technology
Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Pickles-Paterson floods spat highlights true top-down nature of UK policymaking

Danny Fitzpatrick By Danny Fitzpatrick Filed Under: Science and Technology Posted: February 13, 2014

A top-down centralised decision-making process and government functions working in silos are not new features of UK politics, writes Dr Daniel Fitzpatrick. But as communities across the UK experience misery due to flooding, it seems these deeply entrenched pathologies of policymaking are increasingly out of step with the ‘wicked’ issues that society is facing. The […]

Tagged With: cameron, CLG, enviornment agency, floods, paterson, pickles, policy, rain, storms, water, water management

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Skip diving or food waste: which is the bigger crime?

Andrew Balmer By Andrew Balmer Filed Under: Science and Technology Posted: January 29, 2014

In the coming months, three men will face trial for vagrancy for taking discarded food from a skip. Dr Andy Balmer argues that the actual crime is systemic waste throughout the food production and consumption chain. The practice of ‘skipping’ or ‘skip diving’ features intermittently in the news. Often an intrepid reporter dons his or […]

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Placing citizens at the heart of citizen science

Michelle KilfoyleHayley Birch By Michelle Kilfoyle and Hayley Birch Filed Under: Science and Technology Posted: January 22, 2014

Citizen science isn’t new, but new mobile technologies open up huge potential benefits for science, society and the environment, write Michelle Kilfoyle and Hayley Birch. It seems our modern addiction to smartphones, tablets and gaming is not just providing us with new means of communicating and killing time. It is also providing scientists with innovative ways in […]

Tagged With: citizen, mobile, science, technology

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Tough on crime? Lie-detector tests don’t hold all the answers for sex offender management

Andrew Balmer By Andrew Balmer Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: January 15, 2014

The Coalition has decided to drop the privatisation of polygraph, or ‘lie-detector’ tests for sex offenders. But Dr Andrew Balmer believes that the continued use of this flawed technology within the probation service is misguided and the whole programme should be scrapped. Since the Offender Management Act was changed in 2007 to allow for the […]

Tagged With: lie-detector, Offender Management Act, policy, polygraph, privatisation, sex offenders, technology

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Do we need a ‘new settlement’ with Europe – or just a better sausage factory?

Clive Bates By Clive Bates Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: January 10, 2014

In seeking a ‘new settlement’ with the European Union (EU), the UK government is ignoring the existing rules and procedures that should already govern law making, argues Clive Bates. Here he focuses on a current example, the regulation of e-cigarettes, highlights the broader faults in the current process and offers some solutions. Otto Von Bismark […]

Tagged With: cancer, cigarettes, e-cigs, europe, government, health, medicines, policy, Public policy, regulation, smoking

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

UK science is under threat – from English higher education policy

Kieron Flanagan By Kieron Flanagan Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: January 8, 2014

The UK science base must be protected from poorly thought out and badly implemented English higher education reforms, writes Dr Kieron Flanagan. The UK science community has reacted with dismay to the news, leaked to the Guardian, that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (which makes science policy for the UK and provides funds for the UK wide […]

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Evangelising from 32,000 feet: why call for more greens to fly is wrong

Kevin Anderson By Kevin Anderson Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: December 11, 2013

In November 2013, Brendan May wrote a piece for the Guardian’s Environment Blog on ‘Why more environmentalists should fly’. In this article, Professor Kevin Anderson, Dr Dan Calverley and Maria Sharmina respond, strongly arguing the case against having more jet-setting greens.  It was with growing dismay that we read Brendan May’s blog post, in which […]

Tagged With: 2 degrees, aviation, climate change, emissions, environmentalists, flying, global warming, green, mitigation

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

A fair COP? Climate summit good for engagement, but progress was oh so slow

Alice Larkin By Alice Larkin Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: November 27, 2013

At last week’s Conference of the Parties (COP) in Warsaw, key figures met to discuss the small matter of how to combat climate change by cutting carbon emissions. Dr Alice Bows-Larkin travelled there with colleagues, using research to highlight to policy players just how much carbon emissions need to be cut if catastrophic temperature rises […]

Tagged With: 2 degrees, 2°C, carbon, climate change, COP, Tyndall, Warsaw

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Nuclear has come in from the cold, but now we must act to preserve our energy expertise

Francis Livens By Francis Livens Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: November 20, 2013

The UK is to get its first new nuclear power station in a generation. Professor Francis Livens reflects on a policy shift that has seen nuclear power emerge from the wilderness to become a much-hailed clean source energy that will ‘help keep the lights on’. But, he warns, if nuclear is to be our future, […]

Tagged With: carbon reduction, climate change, Dalton Nuclear Institute, edf energy, energy, energy policy, Hinckley, nuclear, nuclear power, Sizewell B

Banner image with Policy@Manchester visual branding

Time is ripe to overhaul UK’s messy surrogacy legislation

Danielle Griffiths By Danielle Griffiths Filed Under: Featured, Science and Technology Posted: November 13, 2013

Dr Danielle Griffiths, along with colleagues Dr Amel Alghrani and Professor Margot Brazier, argue that existing law and regulation of surrogacy in the UK offers little guidance, is out of touch with reality, and needs overhauling as a matter of some urgency The surrogacy industry in India is booming. It has been estimated that Britain is […]

Tagged With: baby, india, law, legislation, regulation, surrogacy, surrogate

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • …
  • 15
  • 16
  • 17
  • 18
  • Next Page »

Our RSS feed

Receive our latest content and timely updates by subscribing to our RSS feed.

 Subscribe in your reader

Become a contributor

Would you like to write for us on a public policy issue? Get in touch with a member of the team, ask for our editorial guidelines, or access our online training toolkit (UoM login required).

Disclaimer

Articles give the views of the author, and are not necessarily those of The University of Manchester.

Policy@Manchester

Manchester Policy Articles is an initiative from Policy@Manchester. Visit our web site to find out more

Contact Us

policy@manchester.ac.uk
t: +44 (0) 161 275 3038
The University of Manchester, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL, UK

Copyright © 2025 · Policy Blog 2 on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in