Yesterday marked Europe Day: the annual commemoration of the signing of the Schuman Declaration on 9 May 1950 and the beginnings of what would become the European Union. Each year Europe Day provides a reminder of what’s been achieved in the past 74 years and lets us reflect on what might come.

Post-Brexit, the UK has found itself on the outside looking-in, and we have lagged behind in terms of economic growth. Indeed, a recent report by Goldman Sachs found Brexit damaged the UK economy to the tune of 5% versus other comparable countries. But beyond the obvious economic effects, we’ve also felt the impact of being outside of the Horizon Europe scheme – the EU's major €95.5 billion research and innovation programme. I have written before about the value of Horizon Europe and I am pleased the UK has now formally associated to the programme. There is now a real imperative for us to coalesce around our key research strengths and demonstrate what we’re able to bring to the table.

New First Minister John Swinney has already spoken of the need to build our economy and give Scotland a competitive edge: essential to this is our ability to tap into the extensive research and innovation networks on our doorstep and to capitalise on the multi-million euro grants available for researchers. If we want to unlock productivity and drive economic growth, then we must enable and invest in Scotland’s high-potential technologies.

Equally, we must have strong visibility in the EU, and we must identify how Scotland’s research strengths might best align with like-minded nations. For example, in key technologies like semiconductors (the chips we find in many of our everyday devices), we know there is considerable European interest already in Scotland’s R&D capabilities. Glasgow colleagues have been working with industry, government and academic partners to shape Scotland’s offering and understand how we might plug into the wider European semiconductor ecosystem, supported by the €43 billion European Chips Act. Similarly for the life sciences and creative technologies like gaming and Virtual Reality/Extended Reality, Scotland has built a reputation across the continent as a key player.

The Herald: European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (Image: free)

Scotland also has significant potential to contribute to the EU’s Global Gateway agenda. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has committed €250 billion in 11 areas (including research) focused on projects in developing regions like the Caribbean and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Scotland is known for its longstanding international development agenda. In Glasgow we host the Blantyre-Blantyre Research Facility with the Kamuzu University of Health Sciences in Malawi, and we recently joined with The Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities – of which Glasgow is a founding member – to create a cluster of new Centres of Research Excellence across Africa and Europe with the African Research Universities Alliance. As an institution we are also continuing our work with the University of the West Indies to deliver a programme of reparative justice, including the advancement of a Glasgow-Caribbean Centre for Development Research.

With association to Horizon Europe, it is vital the strengths of our world-class universities are well-represented in Brussels. And our European colleagues want to engage with us; this message was relayed clearly and positively by European Ambassador Pedro Serrano during a visit to our University last month.

In June, the University of Glasgow will play host to the Horizon Europe Roadshow with Scottish Enterprise, Innovate UK, the Scottish Government, and the UK Department for Science Innovation and Technology (DSIT). These Roadshow events are part of a UK-wide campaign aimed at boosting participation in Horizon Europe, supporting businesses (in particular SMEs), academia and the public sector to collaborate and submit applications for funding. This is a very welcome endeavour, but there are some further challenges we must collectively address.

In recent years universities like mine have had to invest significantly in rebuilding our research grant portfolio. Outside of Horizon Europe, our researchers were unable to lead major European grants and consortia- any institution within the UK was seen as a ‘risky’ partner in the eyes of others in Europe.

Being outside of Horizon Europe has also meant a new generation of early career researchers have missed out on building a valuable network of collaborators from across the EU, but as a University we have benefited from membership of key European networks like The Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities and the CIVIS universities alliance .

Looking to 2028, Horizon Europe will be replaced by the tenth iteration of this programme, provisionally titled Framework Programme 10 (FP10). Work on the development of FP10 is underway and it is essential the UK signals its intention to join the scheme as soon as possible, so we can best catalyse opportunities to build research partnerships and ensure the UK is not left behind. There have already been rumblings about the potential to focus on dual-use technologies (of which the UK could be excluded) and to group all third countries together, meaning the UK and Switzerland would be lumped together with Canada, New Zealand and South Korea. We must ensure that the UK is recognised not only for its geographic proximity to the EU, but also for the significant R&D strengths we have across the four nations.

The key message in the year ahead is we must be patient and we must be visibly committed to Horizon Europe (and FP10). If we do, it will be a win-win situation for us all.

Professor Sir Anton Muscatelli is Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Glasgow