Fight to keep AstraZeneca British: Labour is failing miserably to back a vital industry, says ALEX BRUMMER
There is plenty for the Chancellor to get her teeth into. The London stock market is under siege.
The sad sight of the directors of instrument maker Spectris selling out to KKR for £4.1billion should be an alarm signal.
Most chilling is the prospect of Britain's largest listed company, AstraZeneca, moving its share quote to New York.
The Government's first priority, as it seeks to calm nervy markets after the welfare reform fiasco, should be to prevent such a catastrophe for UK plc.
It is unlikely that Astra has immediate plans to go. But in his darkest moments chief executive Sir Pascal Soriot flirts with the idea as its focus has shifted from Britain to investment in the US and China.
In weighing the matter one should never, however, underestimate the depth of its European roots in Britain and Sweden.
It is this rich research heritage which protected it from disappearing into the hands of American competitor Pfizer in 2014.
The departure of the FTSE 100's most valuable constituent and a company in one of the Government's earmarked growth sectors would be a disaster for the London Stock Exchange, the City, advisory groups and UK life sciences.
If the share quotation goes, so would command and control, brain power, and some research and development.
Labour needs to understand how alienated big pharma has become. Keir Starmer's refusal to back a vaccine plant in Speke, outside Liverpool, was a diabolical error for a Government needing growth industries. Instead, it prefers to pile cash into decarbonising steel production.
The vaccine facility may be water under the bridge. What sticks in the craw is the failure of Health Secretary Wes Streeting, so far, to deliver on pledges to the drugs industry before and after the election.
Britain is brilliant at developing new medicines and the surge in Astra's valuation over the last decade has been driven by its breakthrough remedies for immunology compounds to treat cancers.
As a beneficiary of oncology advances, I have reason to be eternally thankful.
The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, which stepped up its game during the pandemic, has proved effective at offering fast-track approvals.
It is an improvement on the European Medicines Agency which moved from Canary Wharf to the Hague after Brexit.
The UK blockages come at Nice, the agency which does cost benefit analysis for new drugs and devices.
Its hesitancy and flawed analysis have undermined the NHS as a great testbed for new drugs which could be great income-spinners for the UK.
There was, quite frankly, anger when the Government's recent industrial strategy emerged and the promised life sciences review failed to appear.
The industry also has been alienated by a deal under which the rebate to the Government on drug sales was arbitrarily raised to 22.9 per cent from 15 per cent.
In effect, it represents a stealth tax on the UK's leading-edge pharma and bioscience companies.
As a source pointed out, the cure for ballooning welfare bills – a consequence of the 700,000 people added to benefit rolls since Covid – is better health outcomes.
The preventative way of getting people back to work is through vaccines. GSK is a global leader in such cures.
Astra is a powerhouse of new medicines. And Smith & Nephew is a leading force in high-tech surgical dressings, sports ailments and body replacement devices.
A change of language is required. 'Life sciences' sounds pleasant enough but is too vague and all but meaningless to patients.
They need to understand how new pills, drugs, medicines, painkillers and other palliatives can make their lives better and help them avert the grim reaper.
Britain has the companies which can do that, and the connection must be made.
Labour is failing miserably to back a vital industry. The Prime Minister, Rachel Reeves and Wes Streeting are in danger of betraying a key contributor to the nation's health and welfare.
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