Dr. Deirdre Lillis:

I thank the Acting Chair. This was the subject of a public consultation with the community. The model we have landed on, so to speak, and the Government approved is a Government science adviser who provides primarily science advice to Government but does so quite differently from previous iterations. One way is that it is a much more proactive role where they will engage right across Government to try to pre-empt or proactively identify in advance the science advice that might be needed across a lot of policy areas. They will then work with the national science advice committee as a way of sourcing that advice on an ongoing basis. There is also a part of the role which is developing the capacity of Departments in science advice so they have their own capacity to seek it out and receive it when they need it. Again, it is being pre-emptive. It is a more proactive approach and the idea behind the national science advice forum was to bring in the experts from different disciplines who themselves have their own networks they can go to. It is to give that broad connectivity.