Brexit creates big challenges for government science advisers. Can universities help?

As the UK disentangles itself from European regulation, it will have to find its own sources of expertise

Brexiters pursue freedom of choice for the UK. After Brexit, even if UK regulations remain harmonised with the EU, it is we - the people of the UK - who will choose to be harmonised. We will be free to optimise consumer protection and negotiate our own trade relationships rather than fit into deals struck by Brussels. That is the theory.

Whatever model of Brexit emerges, government will become responsible for swathes of policy and regulatory functions that have belonged to the EU for decades. Even Brexit enthusiasts would surely agree that there is no point in self-determination unless we use it wisely.