Price of success

Little thought has been given, judging by the paucity of the Chancellors' televised debate on Channel Four, about how public

spending can actually be reduced sensitively.

This is borne out by the manner in which Ministers have scaled back higher education budgets without thinking through the consequences for universities – and, in particular, those Russell Group institutions like Leeds and Sheffield which find themselves at the cutting edge of research and innovation.

The expertise of their academics is now said to be worth around 2bn to the local economy, thanks, in no small part, to the number of spin-off companies been created on the back of their pioneering research.

As Yorkshire looks to place itself at the vanguard of a low-carbon economy, a process that is already evolving at considerable speed, the importance of high-quality research will become even more important to the region's future prospects.

Yet it will be even more challenging to further advance such work if

such researchers have to spend a disproportionate amount of time in the lecture theatre rather than working in their laboratory.

It is why the spending debate urgently requires some pragmatism rather than rash promises. The consequence could be a scenario where the cuts imposed by Ministers are outweighed by the financial damage caused to the local economy by Whitehall's short-termist thinking.