The UK General Election is set for 6th May 2010 and the main parties have all now launched their manifestos.

But, how does Science, Engineering & Technology feature in their plans?

CaSE

In their blog, CaSE (Campaign for Science and Engineering in the UK) http://blog.sciencecampaign.org.uk try to compare their respective policies to let you see at a glance the party politics as far as the future of science in the UK is concerned.

Who will get the #SciVote – follow the comment and conversation on Twitter?

Skeptical Voter

Also worth checking out and assisting with, where you can in their wiki, is the ‘Skeptical Voter’ site: http://skeptical-voter.org/ . Skeptical Voter intends to identify which parliamentary candidates embrace the use of evidence as a means to inform their decisions and which prefer to obfuscate, ignore or suppress the evidence for political convenience.

It can be quite an eye-opener to see what your local candidates believe in; hopefully it will make you think twice before putting a cross on your ballot paper.

You can also follow @skepticalvoter on Twitter

Vote Match

If you don’t particularly fancy wading your way through all the manifestos, spin and tit-for-tat politics, then there is further help at hand! Vote Match lets you easily discover with which parties agree with your views by answering a series of questions – it takes only 5 minutes and it’s a very clear and useful tool. Try it out: http://www.votematch.org.uk/index.php

Full Party Manifestos

If you do want to dig into the manifestos – look no further! Below are direct links to the main party manifestos – both for the UK and Scotland, where some issues are devolved.

Most of the links below will take you to a page where it’s quite obvious how to read or download the manifesto. Others link directly to a .pdf file.

They are in no particular order and of course there are other parties and independents to consider depending on where you live. Happy reading!

Conservative

http://media.conservatives.s3.amazonaws.com/manifesto/cpmanifesto2010_hires.pdf

Conservative (Scotland)

http://www.scottishconservatives.com/policy/manifesto

Green Party

http://www.greenparty.org.uk/policies.html

Scottish Green Party

http://www.scottishgreens.org.uk/uploaded/Wesminster2010.pdf

Labour

http://www2.labour.org.uk/uploads/TheLabourPartyManifesto-2010.pdf

Labour (Scotland)

http://www.scottishlabour.org.uk/manifesto

Liberal Democrats

http://www.libdems.org.uk/our_manifesto.aspx

Liberal Democrats (Scotland)

http://www.scotlibdems.org.uk/manifesto

Scottish National Party

http://www.snp.org/manifestos/westminster/2010

Plaid Cymru

http://www.plaidcymru.org/content.php?nID=44;catID=7;pubID=264;lID=1

The BBC continues its contribution to world-class science broadcasting and ‘World of Wonder’ through 2010 with a landmark TV series, “The Story Of Science: Power, Proof and Passion” starting at 9pm on 27th April on BBC Two Scotland.

It promises to be an epic exploration of hundreds of years of scientific developments presented by Michael Mosley; a revealing insight into the principles it’s founded upon, the astonishing advances that have gotten us to the present day and the fear it often brings when misunderstood.

Michael, a former doctor, and co-author, John Lynch - the executive producer of the BBC’s international hit ‘Walking With Dinosaurs’, take us on a joined-up journey through the history science from it’s beginnings to where we are today in the accompanying hardback which is on sale now.

Expect “The Story of Science: Power, Proof and Passion” to be available on a 2 disc, DVD from 16th June 2010 with a total runtime of 360 minutes.