SZ/ACSP - Advisory Council on Scientific Policy

SZ/ACSP

Series

Advisory Council on Scientific Policy

1947-1964

36 boxes
11 sub-series

Advisory Council on Scientific Policy
Science and state

Minutes, papers and correspondence, 1947-1964

The Advisory Council on Scientific Policy (ACSP) was established in January 1947 by the Lord President of the Council, Herbert Morrison, in the light of recommendations made in the report of the Committee on Future Scientific Policy – the Barlow Committee (see Series SZ/FSP). The ACSP assumed the mantle of the Scientific Advisory Council to the War Cabinet in respect of civil science, with responsibility for defence research falling to its twin, the Defence Research Policy Committee (DRPC). Specifically the remit of the ACSP was to "advise the Lord President of the Council in the exercise of his responsibility for the formulation and execution of Government science policy". Sir Henry Tizard chaired both the ACSP and DRPC from 1947 until 1952. SZ, who had played a significant part in its creation, was a founder member of the ACSP and served as its Deputy Chairman, first under Tizard and then under his successor, Sir Alexander Todd (Later Lord Todd). SZ also chaired some of the ACSP’s committees, notably the Committee on Scientific Manpower.

In some years the Council’s Annual Report, usually published in July as a Command Paper, was given over to a single topic. The 1951-1952 and 1960-1961 reports (Cmd. 856 and Cmnd 1592) consisted of reports of the Committee on Scientific Manpower, while for 1952-1953 (Sixth Report, Cmd 8874) the subject was the exploitation of science by industry.

The history of the ACSP is to be found in Philip Gummett’s Scientists in Whitehall, Manchester University Press, 1980.

An indexed bound volume of the ACSP’s annual reports, incorporating a copy of the Barlow Committee’s report Scientific Man-power, HMSO, 1946 Cmd 6824, is available for consultation in the Archives Department. Typescript lists of the contents of the series are available for consultation in the Archives Department.