Sir

The Royal Society's working paper on the European science base, discussed in your News story “Europe warned against research council” (Nature 427, 184; 2004), is much more positive about the creation of a proposed European Research Council (ERC) than you suggest. We do express reservations about certain proposals, but this does not mean that a more focused and prioritized version would not benefit research within the European Union (EU).

One of the main reasons that an ERC has been proposed is to increase spending on research and development in the EU, to close the gap with the United States. However, 90% of this gap is due to differences in business expenditure, so the potential creation of an ERC must not divert attention from this problem.

Our paper (http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/policy) highlights other issues, including gaps in knowledge, that should be considered. We are studying proposals in the final Mayor report (http://www.ercexpertgroup.org), released on 15 December 2003, and hope that they will stimulate an informed wider debate.