An ethical approach to industrial strategy isn’t just a ‘nice to have’, it is a key factor in long-term economic prosperity, writes Dr Stuart Parkinson, executive director, Scientists for Global Responsibility
The government has recently published a consultation paper on a new industrial strategy. There will be much debate in coming months about what it should contain, but an aspect that generally attracts little attention is ethics.
Some argue that, with the uncertainties created by Brexit and the election of Donald Trump, ethics are a luxury we cannot afford. But my argument is that we cannot afford not to be ethical. Side-lining ethical concerns, I contend, is contributing to economic problems as well as causing much social and environmental damage.
The shadow of corruption
Let’s start with the issue of corruption. No one in the British engineering community will have failed to notice the £671m settlement that Rolls-Royce recently reached with British, US and Brazilian authorities over allegations of corruption and bribery in numerous military and civilian deals. That such practices were allowed to continue over nearly 25 years in such a prestigious corporation casts a long shadow over UK industry. Furthermore, if you’re tempted to think that these problems are confined to merely one company, don’t forget the settlement of nearly $450m (£367m) that BAE Systems reached a few years ago with the US and UK authorities, also over allegations of bribery. This is an issue that continues to dog industry but is conveniently
ignored in the government’s strategy paper.
Indeed, military industrial corporations are often to be found at the centre of ethical controversies. The government has been especially supportive of UK arms exports, with a marked expansion since 2010 – and Saudi Arabia being the largest recipient despite its very poor human rights record. With that nation now leading military action in Yemen – and having been strongly criticised in a United Nations report for “widespread and systemic” attacks on civilian targets in violation of international humanitarian law – the government is under great pressure to suspend these sales. Yet not only does it refuse; in the proposed industrial strategy it plans further expansion. To put financial considerations above basic human rights sets a very poor example that will only come back to haunt us.

So which industries should be prioritised in a more ethical industrial policy? Given the rapidly growing threat of climate change and the disproportionate impact this will have on those in poverty, one straightforward answer is the low-carbon sectors. These do indeed feature significantly in the strategy paper. However, the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) – the government’s advisory body – has pointed out that current plans fall well short of what is needed to meet our targets for reducing carbon pollution. The planned phase-out of coal and the recent rapid expansion of renewables are very welcome – as is new support for industrial energy efficiency and the development of electric vehicles and energy storage technologies. However, the recent enactment of a string of policies that undermine the onshore wind and solar photovoltaic sectors, coupled with major cuts to home energy conservation programmes, is causing progress to stall. Not only that but thousands of jobs are being lost in these sectors and fuel poverty – estimated to kill nearly 8,000 people a year – is being exacerbated. And, with the costs of solar and wind technologies falling rapidly, the UK is losing out on the two biggest areas of global investment in the energy sector. It’s also striking that marine energy – especially tidal lagoons – and biogas get no mention at all in the industrial strategy, despite their significant promise.
Nuclear problems threaten delivery
The government instead points to the approval of the Hinkley Point C deal and further nuclear power stations in the pipeline. However, with EDF, Toshiba and other nuclear corporations experiencing severe financial problems exactly because of spiralling costs in their nuclear divisions – and despite the promise of huge subsidies – we would be foolish to rely on their ability to deliver.
The government also continues to champion a new fracking industry, despite its unpopularity and advice from the CCC that climate-change targets would be undermined unless three strict conditions were met.
Arguably, the clearest sign of the inadequacy of the proposed UK industrial policy is the narrow focus on economic indicators to measure its progress. In 2015 the UK signed up to the Sustainable Development Goals: 17 major targets for tackling global social and environmental problems, underpinned by nearly 170 indicators. Nowhere in the government’s proposals are these even mentioned, yet industrial policy is a cornerstone of their delivery.
A recent report by PwC found that most younger people were put off an employer if it did not have a good ethical record – with the oil/gas and military industrial sectors having the most negative ratings. This further reinforces the case for the UK to shift, in particular, from an industrial focus on military technologies and fossil fuels to prioritising renewable energy technologies, energy conservation and energy storage.
Some of this shift is already under way. The government’s new industrial strategy is an opportunity to advance it. This is not just so we can feel good about ourselves – it would make good business sense as well.
Really. Who’d have thought.
Could we please add “Engineers” for global responsibility as well?
Might I yet again refer to the pivotal point in my first lecture: received in 1960 from the Dean of Engineering at St Andrews.
“Break Nature’s Laws and both detection and punishment are immediate.”
” To put financial considerations above basic human rights sets a very poor example that will only come back to haunt us.” Not only come back! It hits us/haunts (if you are a thinker with morals) us all every day. The corrollory has to be that there are far too many who neither think past the next election, nor have any morality to guide those thoughts they do have? Roll on Utopia! -though on present indications, we will have destroyed ourselves long before then!
While I must agree that we are responsible for the current disasters in the middle-east, Yemen, Syria and Iraq are all victims of our “Ethical policies”. The biggest problem for all of us is that one mans moral stance can be another’s immorality. A good example in the article is the climate change act: this immoral act was pushed through parliament by a group of powerful advisors who remain unaccountable for their support for a hypothesis that was called “proven science” by advocates who closed-off all critical comment ruthlessly and is already costing UK industry and increasing energy poverty in the UK, which we all believed to be a thing of the past.
Moralists have an important place in understanding the world but are not top of the Maslow triangle of needs for good reason.
I fail to see how the Deepwater Horizon image has anything to do with ethical decisions. If people understand the real failure on Deepwater Horizon it has little to do with ethical issues.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FCVCOWejlag
When a picture looks good but doesn’t match the story……..
In a similar vein the story alludes to unethical practices in Oil & Gas industry. To my knowledge this may be practice in Brazil (Petrobras) although not constrained to the industry but apparently embedded in government but occurs no-where else in this industry. Can we stick to reporting fact and not conjecture if this tome intends to maintain credibility from its readership.
A federal judge ruled that BP was primarily responsible for Deepwater Horizon through deliberate misconduct and gross negligence. Deliberate misconduct implies an ethical issue by any definition of “ethics”.
According to insiders (there’s a nice coverall) there was another major US company just as, if NOT more culpable as BP (who’s staff allegedly told BP to do what they did) and guess who took the ‘rap’ (£60+billion and counting) Oh what it is to be a Federal Judge in Texas? How come no-one went to gaol? Piper Alpha, anyone?
BP and Transocean blamed each other. However, the enquiry found that BP was at fault.
Deepwater Horizon was owned and operated by TransOcean and American company. Interestingly TransOcean filed (successfully) with the American courts before the case was concluded to limit their liability.
While the oil field is a BP field (who also took the wrap) what is not often known is that pretty much all the drilling, commissioning etc of subsea (and surface) wells is carried out by third parties with specialist knowledge of that element of the operation. In this case BP (the operator) would only take over after all the commissioning and well testing were complete. Yes, they would have input up to that point but would rely on their contractors to perform until full production handover. The fact the BOP (Blow Out Preventer) was on the well indicates the well was incomplete or under work over (re-commisioning, extension etc) which would be the responsibility of the drillers and drill rig operators (in this case TransOcean). The rig with its safety systems (including BOP) belonged to TransOcean and was operated and maintened by them. While BP took the rap, personally I think they were hard done by, although probably did the correct thing to preserve their reputation as much as possible.
I work in the oil industry (Subsea System Design) and its surprising how little the operator (e.g. BP, Shell, Centrica, Exxon, Petrobras, etc., etc. ) has to do with the system until its fully commissioned and operating. Yes they are involved but most of the work until commissioning is complete is under the hands (and control) of other contractors.
no hint here of Haliburton’s role-responsibility as cementation contractor nor indeed of urging for paired BOPs post-PiperAlpha, postscripted on OTO98162 commissioned for Cullen compliance by HSE-OSD issued in 3 months for sector’s urgent attention but shelved for 5 years after threatened lawsuit by a software vendor, finally issued after retiring CS’s swansong for articles amendment requiring release of all approved advice, signed off within a week indeed by incoming ’97 SecState in pursuit of reforming reputation!
Did no one else but me react with horror to the ad, alongside the article, for a “Tactical Flashlight” that can blind a bear? What ethics are involved there, both in creating it and imagining the consequences of its use? Poor bear! And what other horrendous uses could it be put to?
It is good to see such things written. As an Electronics Engineer, I have been able to avoid the military industrial complex, more-or-less since I started work in 1975. At that time it was possible to pick and chose because there was virtually full employment, no homelessness – unless people chose to live on the street. Consequently you did not have to just take any job.
There is another aspect though I was at college with many engineers who had got in to the military industrial complex did not like it but very few bothered to then get out of it again. I must say I only had respect for the guys who did get out but not for the ones who avoided the issue or said well at least my bit does not work.
If they begged a Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament badge from me I would give it to them. I also wore Electronics for Peace Badge. Very few stand up and say no. The article is inspiring and I hope people vote with the feet not moan and do nothing.
Andrew Lohmann: I loved your piece. I respect you greatly, and those of your contemporaries who opted out! of the IMC [that’s a TLA and means industrio-military complex] As we (that is you soft-ware and logic and programming folk!) move towards autonomous equipment of every type (and absolute electronic based control ) hopefully this represents the bits and bytes of the new ‘conflicts’ which will occur. Asymetric warfare is the new buzz-word of the military? [This means, the bastards who are our enemies are NOT playing fair! (Like their predecessors, they are NOT actually standing out in the open, like Rambos matching us ‘gun for gun’ but actually metaphorically hiding behind trees and disappearing into the darkness.) I have to hope that the proper application of your/your colleagues software skills could ensure that we know everything about where, when, how, those who would do us ill, operate. Not only that but ensure that ‘whatever ‘kit’ they have can be ‘spiked’ before it goes off. Intellectual superiority is surely the ultimate prize? I support fully HMGs giving additional cash to ensure that ‘our’ mental attacks on theirs are more and more successful. But of course, the Establishment has always known that once ‘they’ are cleverer than ‘we’ are (they being those lower down in any internal pecking order and we being the RIPs (Rich, in charge and and powerful) they will gain control: and this time keep it? And that would never do.
I’ve re-read the article and am even more dubious about the benefits of Ethical policy. Ethical policy is based on someone knowing the correct ethical stance and on many of the topics raised these are not at all clear.
The sale of weapons to Saudi is a good example: we are not only supplying arms to attack one of the worlds poorest countries because it does no accept Saudi control but also supporting one of the world’s most corrupt regimes. Why? Because the USA supports them, so they are the good guys. However, to stop selling these arms is to give our competitors a free entry; in addition to reducing our ability to defend the UK and causing unemployment / worsened B of Ps.
Climate change is at long last under dispute and the energy poverty being created by the foolish Climate Change Act is being made clear, yet the ethical argument would apparently support the zealots who have for many years controlled and censored the climate debate.
Leave ethics and morality to the philosophers, preachers and politicians to mess-up. It is not the province of scientists and engineers.
Jack B’s comment about Saudi and its purchase of ‘arms’ comes very close to home!
fellow bloggers might recall that I attended a rather special school: for which the only entrance requirement was that your father had been a Freemason and was dead! Consequently, it took boys of all levels of academic potential, from all strata of society and from all over the country: truely comprehensive. Amongst the boys in my House (when I was its Head and 2 or 3 years older) and Corps platoon (when I was its sergeant!) was Sir Dick Evans: Thatcher’s favourite capitalist and the CEO of BAe etc. who was responsible for the start of the many ‘deals’ which have provided many billions to UK plc. Sir Dick had always said that it is NOT his role to decide who received such material: it the Government wishes it, he merely complied. I have to wish that we sold looms or spinning machines rather than rockets: but if (sadly) our economy is presently based and biased towards such -and the income keeps vast numbers in employment- is it such a bad thing? I am just asking, I do not have an answer, even if I do have an opinion.
As usual this article has had a good range of responses reflecting the moral stance of engineers. I remain sceptical of the role of engineers (or scientists) in morals and ethics, other than as personal opinions. Reading Mike Bs letter reminds me of the Tom Lehrer song about Werner Von Braun “When the rockets go up who cares where they come down, that’s not my department said Werner von Braun”.
But to raise a serious point related to the article about engineers wanting ethical employers: I’ve just read the latest “Top Undergraduate Employers” listing and was not surprised to see that only 25 of the top 100 companies were in engineering…. this reflects a Bob Dylan song “money doesn’t talk it swears…”. So much for ethics and morality as drivers!
A PS related to the “Top Undergraduate Employers”, the top 30 has no engineering companies and is totally dominated by banks and law practices: proving conclusively that ethics and morality can be bought and sold just like arms.
Undergrads like money and power could also be a conclusion.
Adding to my comment on the Nuclear Military Industrial Complex — The UK’s spending is one of the highest in the world. A comment that an engineer made when I was at college about not liking the work but not wanting to leave the industry was “at least my bit does not work”. This is possibly comparable to the firing squad excuse – that most of the soldiers had blank bullets. We see this in so much military equipment does not work but is spun out and spun out never completed. Some of these could have a good civilian use if they had worked.
This editorial was fairly influential in the formation of Electronics for Peace in about 1980;
http://www.thinkhumanism.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=1718
This is a sort of rot that spreads into everything – mutual societies in the past would look after your savings – now companies make money and it is indecently cut where they supply the service. Of course many big companies do a have a code of ethics — look after little suppliers, customers etc. There are fewer and fewer of those (the rot spreading as I said)