[notahacker]

Sure, I'm disagreeing with the principle that government investment has no place in a world where VCs exist rather than praising the design of this particular scheme (no prizes for guessing which former SPAD known for being almost as enthusiastic about zero accountability as science might have designed it...).

As I'm sure you know there are less um... creative uses of R&D tax credits and SEIS too, and I've heard some very strange entirely private sector funding arrangements ("but we don't need to worry about whether the losses on taking on this project with that obligation will burn our remaining capital, because someone who used to work at that company will be impressed enough to angel invest") proposed too. And some rank bad recipients of everyday properly tendered government procurement, for that matter.

And I presume oligarchs and money laundering operations actually want the paper trail to provide vaguely plausible explanations for being in London with the ability to write large cheques.