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Advising parliament
BY R A C HEL BR A Z IL | 1 0 FEBR U A R Y 2 0 2 3

Xameerah Malik helps MPs to navigate the science that influences policy
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Although it wasn’t an early

Advising on science
ambition, working in science policy at t he House of
policy may have always been on Commons Library
the cards for Xameerah Malik,
head of the science and St udy says UK
environment section at the House underest imat ed
off shore met hane
of Commons Library. ‘I was
emissions from oil and
really interested in what was going gas act ivit y
on in the world. I think there was
a part of me that always wanted to What Rihanna t aught
So urce : C o urte s y o f Xa me e ra h Ma lik
do something that would impact me about
Xameerah Malik in f ront of some of the briefings that the House
decision-makers,’ says Malik. She int ersect ionalit y and
of Common Library prepares f or MPs
inclusion
now uses her chemistry
background to provide MPs with
US accelerat or
accurate scientific information to deal with correspondence from constituents, as well as
accident hospit alises
providing briefings for House of Commons bills and debates. worker, delays XFEL
st art up
Malik moved with her family from Nairobi, Kenya to London, UK, when she was eight
years old. She doesn’t remember being particularly interested in chemistry until her A- From t he St
levels, probably due to bad teaching. However, she chose to do an A-level in chemistry with Valent ine’s Day
the view to studying environmental science at university. In the end a great chemistry teacher 1
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changed her mind and she opted for a chemistry degree at the University of Southampton,
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This led to a job with Syngenta as a research chemist, but after a year she realised it wasn’t Re:action, our handcraf ted weekly digest
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quite right for her – she wanted her work to have more immediate impact. Joining the Royal
range of international sources.
Society of Chemistry’s graduate recruitment scheme led to a role in science policy. Malik
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admits leaving laboratory science behind did cause some guilt. ‘I certainly felt really
conscious of how few women there were in science at senior levels,’ she says. Do you already have an account?
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In 2009 Malik became a committee specialist for the House of Commons science and Sign up t o email
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technology select committee, the panel of MPs tasked with scrutinising government science- Get the latest chemistry research,
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related policy. Specialists manage committee inquiries, helping to define the terms of
reference, analyse evidence and advise MPs on technical content. ‘Most of them don’t have Re:act ion
science backgrounds or enough time to get into the science, so that’s why you have specialist
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staff,’ says Malik.
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Working in the House of Commons was ‘terrifying at first’, but Malik found her footing SIGN UP ADVERT IS EMENT

relatively quickly: ‘I never really felt like I didn’t fit’. She stresses that MPs are mostly ‘just
normal people’ and the work is very collaborative. ‘I’ve only ever had really good
experiences with the MPs I’ve worked for, and [been shown] respect for the advice and
knowledge that I have.’

The first inquiry she was involved in was on homeopathy in 2009 – one that garnered a lot
of public attention. Malik says she was really pleased she could provide the chemical context
for committee members and make it clear ‘the chemistry of this doesn’t make sense’.

From 2014 she had a number of policy-related positions, inside and outside of science,
including a year’s secondment to work with Anne Glover, the then chief scientific adviser to
the president of the European Commission. ‘It was a completely different policy
environment and culture,’ she says. ‘Everything in Brussels is on a grand scale compared to
national parliaments.’ Malik supported Glover in her policy work on genetically modified
crops, and picked up a greater understanding of how policy makers need to understand
public views even if they clash with scientific evidence.

More recently, Malik became head of the science and environment section, one of the eight
sections in the House of Commons Library, where she manages a team that provides
information for MPs and their staff on science or environment-related questions and
provides briefings on bills and upcoming House of Commons debates. ‘You get lots of
really interesting questions on things that you might never have thought of before,’ says
Malik.

Information the library provides for MPs is confidential but Malik says that over the last
few years they have had lots of Covid-related queries. Now the focus has shifted to
questions on energy, with massive price hikes causing increased interest in scientific progress
on renewable energy sources. ‘In the last year I’ve answered questions on chemicals used in
fracking, the fire risk of lithium ion batteries, the recyclability of wind turbines and food
hygiene,’ says Malik.

Working at the interface of policy and science is like being a translator. ‘We research quite
technical things, but you still have to be able to explain it in a way that a layperson can
understand, particularly if you know that what you are doing is then going to be used to talk
to a constituent,’ says Malik. Her role is not to educate MPs in the details of the science itself
but to help them navigate unfamiliar areas to find the answers they need. ‘In parliament, one
thing I have noticed in the past when I’ve worked with other scientists is the ones who tend
to do the best are the ones who understand that politicians have to balance the science with
other issues like politics, cost and ethics,’ she concludes.
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