20150203_R4
Source: BBC Radio 4: Today Programme
URL: N/A
Date: 03/02/2015
Event: Anne Glover: Greenpeace and other anti-GM NGOs are "not honest"
Credit: BBC Radio 4: Today Programme
People:
- Professor Anne Glover: Former Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission
- James Naughtie: Presenter, BBC Radio 4 Today Programme
James Naughtie: Professor Anne Glover became Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission three years ago. She's just left the post, as she had intended to do after three years, but she's been told by the new President of the Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, that the role is being scrapped. Now she was meant to provide independent scientific advice to the Commission, but that advice, on genetically modified crops, was controversial, because she was outspoken in support of the technology that's now available, and she accused some of the opposition to it as "a form of madness". It's claimed in some quarters that it was her position on that subject that led to the post of Chief Scientific Adviser being abolished. Well, Professor Glover is here in the studio with us - good morning.
Anne Glover: Morning.
James Naughtie: Do you think that the post has been abolished because of your stance on GM crops?
Anne Glover: I would think that would be very unlikely. Because you mentioned that it was controversial - the evidence really isn't controversial.
James Naughtie: No, but your stance was, because a lot of people take a different view on the evidence which to you is incontrovertible, but you know it's a matter of extremely passionate argument.
Anne Glover: I think that many people are against GM technology or GM crops because of an ideological position. But it isn't controversial to think about the evidence, because the evidence is very clear that the technology is safe.
James Naughtie: No, I wasn't saying the evidence was controversial, I was saying people's attitude to it is controversial - I mean, that's a fact.
Anne Glover: Well, I know that there are many people who don't like the technology.
James Naughtie: Exactly. Now, you're very blunt about this - you've just been blunt about it, right now. Do you think that it is this row - it's inescapable, isn't it, that one of the reasons that the post has gone is because you took the position you've just articulated here, and a lot of people don't like it.
Anne Glover: Well, I think what would be fair to say is that if the Commission were to decide to have another Chief Scientific Adviser, for me it would be almost unimaginable that that person would hold views any different than mine, because they would have to have views that were supported by the evidence, so they would - yeah, they would say the same as I do.
James Naughtie: Yeah, you think it's impossible to have a scientist who wouldn't take your view of GM crops.
Anne Glover: No, there are scientists who don't agree with what I say, but the vast consensus, the majority information would tell us that it's a safe technology...
James Naughtie: You see, one of the arguments that's surrounded this was that if you have a Chief Scientific Adviser, in the role that you fulfilled for the Commission, you're fantastically powerful, because you go straight to the President - maybe you don't feel fantastically powerful -
Anne Glover [laughing]: No.
James Naughtie: - you're smiling. But you go straight to the President - you know, you're in charge, and you say "Right, this is safe", "That's not safe", whatever it happens to be. And there are a lot of groups who, for their own reason, you know, want to lobby this way or that way, who feel cut out. That's the real problem, isn't it.
Anne Glover: Actually, what you describe I think sounds absolutely horrific, and of course that isn't the case, because that wouldn't be at all democratic. And just to emphasise, Chief Scientific Advisers are not elected, unlike politicians, so they don't have a democratic mandate.
James Naughtie: What's democratic about the European Commission?
Anne Glover: Well, I - that's a whole different argument. You're asking me about scientific advice, and I think, from my point of view, the European Commission - actually, I would commend them, as a body, particularly a body that supports scientific research. But setting that aside, I think that my position never was one which was described in the way that you just described it. I did report directly to the President, I briefed him -
James Naughtie: You mean you wouldn't ride roughshod over other - other forms of -
Anne Glover: Not that I wouldn't - I couldn't.
James Naughtie: Yeah. Yeah.
Anne Glover: It would not be possible for me to do that, and quite rightly so.
James Naughtie: You'd just give your judgement on things you were asked to comment on.
Anne Glover: I mostly did that, and I think what's important is that those people who criticised the post also knew that that was not the case. In other words, I was not some incredibly powerful person that could dictate what happened. That's - that's just a fiction.
James Naughtie: What is your attitude to those groups who opposed you on the GM technology? And they included Greenpeace, the Pesticide Action Network, the Health and Environmental Alliance, GMWatch and so one, who wrote to Juncker on this subject - what do you think of their attitude to GM crops?
Anne Glover: I'm deeply disappointed with them - I've -
James Naughtie: Why?
Anne Glover: Because those NGOs that you mentioned were NGOs that I used to trust, and I think many citizens do trust - they're like an unelected voice of citizens. And I think that they have ignored the evidence and they have fabricated a scenario -
James Naughtie: Fabricated.
Anne Glover: Yeah, I think they've fabricated - if I look at their letter and what they describe, because I've met with many of them, they know that simply it's not true what they talk about. But they have an ideology, they have a philosophy that they wish to pursue, and I think that's fair enough, but I think that you shouldn't try and back it up by evidence, or if you like, bad-calling the evidence. That's not honest.
James Naughtie: Professor Anne Glover, departing Chief Scientific Adviser to the President of the European Commission, thanks very much for joining us.
Anne Glover: Thank you.