Introduction

49. The RCIs are expressly designed to be strategically-run organisations, with a clear mission and a well-defined place within the strategy of their parent Research Councils. As Professor Blakemore told us, "if you looking for a single word to sum up the reasons for having institutes then it is strategy".[109] There are several different bodies with an interest in influencing the strategy of RCIs, including the institutes themselves, the Research Councils and the Government. In this chapter we examine how each of these players can bring its influence to bear and how their differing interests can be co-ordinated.

RCI management

50. The directors of RCIs enjoy a wide degree of autonomy. The directors of the BBSRC institutes explained that once a business plan has been agreed with their sponsoring Council, "a lot of the running of the institute is left very much to us to develop a science structure which is consistent with the BBSRC's mission" (Professor Shirley, IAH).[110] This has both long-term and short-term advantages. In the long term it means that each RCI is able to take a strategic view of its own area of interest and the capabilities which will be necessary to underpin research in this area. Professor Shirley gave the example of the IAH programme on avian immunology which can now encompass the topical threat of avian flu.[111] He explained that:

"As an institute we evaluate our science programmes on a regular basis. We constantly look at the fit-for-purpose of our programmes. We have the ability to close programmes down if we think they are not going in the right direction or are not productive, but we can also start programmes up if we so wish by using our core strategic grant.".[112]

This long-term strategic planning can include the retention or development of facilities which may not be immediately relevant but which could be vital in the future. Again, some of the more long-running monitoring work could fall into this category but it also includes science programmes in less fashionable areas and facilities.

51. As a result of this freedom to interpret their mission, the RCIs are able to exploit the short-term advantage of their autonomy to respond quickly to unanticipated requests. For example, IGER and Rothamsted Research were able to undertake farm scale evaluations of GM crops for the Government when the issue suddenly arose out of nowhere. Professor Crute of IGER told us: "Because we had expertise in place in weed biology, in invertebrate biology and knowledge of the sort of mathematical processes of sampling, we were able, literally overnight, to put together very substantial teams of people to address that."[113] Another example would be the response of the IAH to the foot and mouth crisis when, as the BBSRC Chief Executive put it, "everyone at Pirbright just stopped all their long term research and went immediately into crisis mode".[114]

52. This ability to respond rapidly and flexibly to new requirements is highly valuable to all the customers of RCIs and is dependent upon the RCI director being able to redirect the core strategic grant to cover new demands. He or she can also move people around and reallocate use of facilities to ensure that the work can be properly conducted. This can mean diverting staff from their planned activities and occasionally hiring temporary staff. Professor Crute explained that with the farm scale trials, "it was a combination of taking proportions of people's time to divert them on the basis of priority plus some additional recruitment and training of staff to meet those objectives".[115] One disadvantage of this may be that PhD students are prevented from completing their research in the time allotted but the BBSRC assured us that with foot and mouth at least "we gave money to make sure PhD students were not disadvantaged"[116] and we can see the attractions for students and indeed staff at such institutes of working together as a team to use their expertise to address a crisis situation.

53. The difficulty faced by the institute directors is that the maintenance of the capacity which they need to meet these sudden requests is very expensive and it is not clear how it should be funded in the meantime. The Biosciences Federation raised what it rightly called "an unanswerable question" of how long a capacity should be maintained where it has considerable cost implications, pointing out that the IAH "very nearly closed all work on scrapie" which would have greatly reduced the UK capacity to work on BSE.[117] The Federation commented that "A capacity must be sufficiently versatile so that it is making useful scientific contributions even in times other than crises".[118] This is a hard call for the institute directors to make but it is clear that they take their responsibilities for protecting UK research capacity very seriously. Professor Shirley of IAH, for example, told us that "we are very mindful of the long-term needs of the UK science base … if we think that this is an area of science which is critical and it maybe does not fit, for whatever reason, Defra's portfolio of interest, we can—and we have done in the past—use our core strategic grant to make sure that we can retain the skills of particular individuals".[119] Both Professor Shirley and Professor Crute of Rothamsted Research gave examples of where they had been forced to take such steps to protect areas of national importance where funding had been terminated or reduced.[120]

54. We greatly welcome the flexibility accorded to directors of RCIs to develop their own strategies and to redirect their resources to best advantage, both in the long and short term. We also applaud their far-sighted attitude towards custodianship of national capabilities which may become of sudden strategic importance. Nevertheless, we recognise that this is not sustainable in the long run. It is a major advantage of individual institutes that they take responsibility for strategy in unfashionable high risk areas of science but they cannot be expected continually to reallocate ever diminishing resources to maintain capacity without recognition of the vital role they are playing in doing so (see paragraph 77 below).

Research Councils and strategy

55. The use of RCIs by Research Councils varies according to the remit of each Council and the type of work needed to fulfil it. EPSRC, for example, has no RCIs of its own, although it has responsibility for the Culham Laboratory which conducts nuclear fusion research. Of the other Councils, BBSRC, MRC, NERC and PPARC all invest large sums of money in RCIs, and the AHRC and ESRC each have a significant number of centres all based within university settings.[121] In each case, evidence from the six Councils involved was strongly in favour of the RCI structure and the advantages which RCIs brought to the Councils in furthering their own overarching strategy. AHRC, for example, believes that "they provide a means through which the AHRC is able rapidly to enhance capacity, capability and awareness in a field, and to secure advances in knowledge and understanding through concentrated collaborative working"[122]; the BBSRC regards "its sponsored institutes as essential to the lifeblood of the UK's biotechnology and biological science research base"[123]; and ESRC considers them "central to the ESRC's strategy to develop the UK social science research base and strengthen its position on the international stage".[124]

56. The Research Council Chief Executives who gave evidence to us all strongly believed that the mission for RCIs should be decided by the Council, rather than by other players. Professor Thorpe of NERC, for example, told us that "we see our institutes as a major player in delivering our science strategy so the council very much regards the institutes as a vital bit of that and therefore wants to have a strong say in decision-making process on how they go forward."[125] Similarly, the MRC Chief Executive told us firmly that "the needs are entirely specified by the council".[126] He went on to explain that in this way the Council could ensure that national needs were met, citing the example of the toxicology unit in Nottingham which had been established to respond to "a national need to have a centre of excellence in toxicology": "it is unlikely that any university could provide the critical mass to sustain that and we feel there is a responsibility to do so in the case of a particular need".[127] As with the RCI directors themselves, the Chief Executives of the Research Councils also regarded RCIs as giving them valuable flexibility in that the institutes could be rapidly redirected by the Councils to pursue research in newly emerging areas of interest. Professor Thorpe told us:

"It is a critical advantage of Research Council Institutes it seems to me that we can respond very quickly to discoveries. The Antarctic ozone hole would be a good example for NERC where the discovery led to substantial amounts of extra unforeseen activity to be needed. Because NERC has a very major part of its budget committed to council institutes we have the ability to be flexible."[128]

57. The Councils do, however, recognise that other parties have an interest in the strategies followed by RCIs. Julia Goodfellow of BBSRC explained:

"our Councils make the final decisions on what they want to fund, so it is a council decision, but it would not be sensible for the institutes not to think about what we want and what other funders like Defra or the EU want because they are getting funds from a lot of places. Although our institutes come out with their own five year strategies which are agreed by their governing board, reflected in that is their knowledge of what some government departments—Department of Health or Defra—might want from them."[129]

This underlines one of the defining features of RCIs, namely their greater responsiveness to the needs of the customers for their research than universities are able to offer. It also highlights the fact that institutes face multiple pressures in setting their priorities.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN RESEARCH COUNCILS AND THEIR INSTITUTES

58. One issue that all stakeholders agreed on in evidence to us is that the wide variations in the structure and purpose of RCIs means that the relationship between each of them and their parent Council was unique and therefore a matter for the individual Research Council to determine. We asked the directors of RCIs about their relationships with their parent Councils. Those directors from whom we took oral evidence were broadly warm in their appreciation of the support they had received from their Councils. Professor Shirley of IAH, for example, told us that "the working relationship I have had as director and as acting director with BBSRC has been incredibly positive and very supportive".[130] His colleague, Professor Pollack of IGER, concurred, particularly in light of the recent financial crisis at his institute.[131] He explained that BBSRC had "worked out short-term financial measures to keep the institute solvent" and "helped us to negotiate through sale of fixed assets a way forward which gives us the aspiration to a stable business over the next five years." He concluded that "I could not have asked for a more positive relationship with BBSRC over the last 12 months".[132] On the part of NERC institutes, the praise was perhaps less full but, equally, little criticism was voiced. Professor Nuttall of CEH told us that "I would say our relationship with NERC is a good one now; it has been through a difficult time but we now have an understanding, we have a way forward".[133] It appears from these comments and the lack of counter-evidence that relationships between Research Councils and the directors of RCIs are in the main good and that the RCIs generally feel that support is available when they need it but that they are allowed to "operate without undue interference", as the director of the Tyndall Centre put it, in the running of their organisations once a contract or five year strategy is established.[134]

59. Witnesses suggested that RCIs should have a say in the decision-making procedures which determine the strategy of the Councils themselves. After all, it is the RCIs which carry prime responsibility in many cases for ensuring that the mission of the Council is realised and which could feed back information on areas of science which may need additional attention in the near future. There is a clear division here between management and staff in their involvement with Council activities. For example, Professor Crute of Rothamsted Research told us that "all directors have a role … within the operation of BBSRC", his own including membership of the BBSRC Strategy Board and the BBSRC Estates and Equipment Board.[135] The union Prospect, on the other hand, told us that "there is no voice for employees as a key stakeholder group" on either institute governing boards or Research Council boards, which "is at odds with the university senate model in which employee representatives are able to participate both in the overall management of their institution and in determining its strategic direction."[136] It should be remembered in this context that, in many cases, institute staff are directly employed by the Research Councils.

60. The Chief Executives of NERC and BBSRC defended themselves against these criticisms by pointing out that, in the case of NERC, "our major research institute directors [have] an executive board role to manage NERC as a whole" and that "there are a significant number of research institute scientists [on NERC's science advisory panels] but they are on those panels by virtue of their scientific disciplines and knowledge".[137] Both Chief Executives felt that it was right not to have institute directors on the Council because "our council members are there to be independent and obviously our research centre directors have particular strong vested interests in their particular areas."[138] In addition, as Professor Goodfellow explained, on the Council "we are making formal decisions about how much funding [the RCIs] are going to get".[139] There is obviously merit in this argument. Professor Guy Dodson, formerly of NIMR, suggested that "four factors are essential to successful management of institutes by RCs": proper representation and balance on Council; transparency; consistency; and sensitivity to the views and concerns of staff.[140] We endorse this view and note that it can be achieved without the presence of staff or directors from an institute on all decision-making bodies of a Research Council. What is vital is that the Council is able to command the respect of the staff of an Institute, and it is clear that an important aspect of this is the balance of members of that Council and the transparency and fairness of its dealings.

HARMONISATION OF PRACTICE

61. Our terms of reference for this inquiry included examination of the case for greater harmonisation of practice. In support of the current position, the Government told us that "individual Research Councils are responsible for choosing the precise way in which they manage and fund their institutes",[141] while RCUK explained that "the approaches to establishment and support of RCIs reflect the nature of the science and research they have been established to deliver".[142] We have detected no enthusiasm for greater uniformity and indeed were told by one witness, the University of Leeds, that "The responsibilities of the several Research Councils for quite different fields and characters of research mean that any imposed 'harmonisation of practice' would be at best ineffective and at worst harmful".[143] PPARC supported this, telling us that "greater harmonisation of practices could conceivably preclude PPARC from being fully involved in future international establishments and projects and consequently limit our ability to provide UK researchers with access to the state-of-the-art facilities necessary for competitive research".[144] Given the range of different institutes encompassed under the umbrella title of "RCI", we agree that general moves towards harmonisation of practice would be impractical and non-beneficial.

62. In certain areas of the support offered by Research Councils and RCUK, however, general lessons may be drawn. We support the suggestion that the Research Councils should have a role in disseminating best practice and co-ordinating the activities of their RCIs. We were told by the BBSRC directors that "at the moment it is a sort of bottom-up approach of sharing best practice" which was "a very effective way of operating".[145] Professor Pollock explained that:

"At a scientific level there is increasing and effective communication. We have already joint programmes of work in key areas of science that stretch between ourselves, Rothamsted, John Innes and Scottish Crops Research Institute, so there are, I think, plenty of opportunities to ensure that good science is being carried out in a cost-effective manner. The BBSRC institute directors meet regularly, informally among themselves, to discuss issues of improved best practice in both science and governance and increasingly those discussions are beginning to involve colleagues north of the Border as well."[146]

63. However, there seems to be no mechanism for best practice to be passed on throughout the system, and the Tyndall Centre also argued that "no infrastructure exists within the RCs to facilitate co-ordination instead of competition between research institutes, or perhaps more importantly, between their knowledge transfer efforts".[147] NERC itself told us that it was "keen to work with other Research Councils to achieve a greater harmonisation of approaches in supporting RCIs, based on benchmarking and best practice."[148] We believe that there is scope for more discussion and development of best practice in relation to RCIs, both in terms of the support given to them by Research Councils and in terms of their own activities. We recommend that the Research Councils review their mechanisms for developing and encouraging best practice in relation to RCIs, both on the part of the Councils and also between the institutes themselves.

REVIEWS

64. The process by which the Research Councils set the strategy for their institutes begins with the initial proposals for core funding to establish or continue an institute and continues through the regular review of an RCI's business plan and quinquennial review of all its activities. The 2001 quinquennial review of the grant-awarding research councils made recommendations regarding the regular review of RCIs by their parent Councils. It set out "common and explicit criteria" to be followed by all Councils in judging the effectiveness and efficiency of institutes (the same criteria as those for establishing an institute, set out in paragraph 14 above) and a separate list of eight principles to be applied to the review process to ensure openness and transparency.[149] It also enjoined Councils to "consider strategic options for the future, particularly in the event that Council institutes do not satisfactorily meet the criteria that we have set out."[150] These options should "include rationalisation, restructuring, merger, contracting out, market testing, privatisation and abolition".[151]

65. In accordance with these principles all RCIs are reviewed regularly; every four to five years in the case of NERC and BBSRC. There are minor differences in the way the process has been carried out. For example, the University of Leeds pointed out that "BBSRC reviews and renews all its RCIs together, whereas NERC does them separately at different times."[152] The basic approach is similar, however, in that it involves external independent assessment of the performance of the institutes. Professor Goodfellow of BBSRC explained that: "we have peer review panels and we get international referees; the panels visit the institutes for three or four days; we also look at knowledge transfer and innovation; we look at training and we have looked for the first time this year at Science in Society, what they are doing on public dialogue".[153] She added that:

"We also look at quality in two ways. We recognise that papers in Nature and Science may not be what other policy funders want. If you look at work on the agricultural side they actually may want a bit of paper that can go out to a farmer and that might be the right output so you have to look at quality fit for purpose. We actually gave them two scores this year, we gave them the score for the BBSRC science on the same rating as we would for any university coming in. We also gave them ratings on their knowledge transfer, on the output for other stakeholders and was that what they wanted? Was it fit for purpose, better than they thought it was going to be or less than expected?"[154]

All this information is made publicly available. MRC also stressed the importance of the quality assessment of the institutes at the time of review. Professor Blakemore explained that "When proposals come to boards for renewal, the quinquennial review of institutes or units, their quality is expressing precisely the same terms, the same ranking mechanisms, peer review and so on as the grant applications that the same board is looking at in the same session."[155] This is important to reassure universities that institutes are not receiving favourable treatment from the Councils.[156]

66. We asked the institute directors for their opinions of the review process and were surprised at the strength of their support. Professor Pollock of IGER explained that this was because "it has been set up in a way that acknowledges the breadth of mission of individual institutes and because it involves a personal visit from the panel to look at the work in its totality."[157] He described the assessment as "a very important and extremely valuable tool in benchmarking institute outputs as a whole against relevant international standards."[158] Professor Pollock's only "gripe" was that before the review process moved to a five-year cycle, they did "tend to come around a bit often".[159] The director of Rothamsted Research agreed, but he also had reservations about the composition of the panels which were "generally composed of a mix of academics and other people who represent industry or sectoral interests" and who did not have experience of the institute environment.[160] We note this view but we have seen no evidence that this in itself has caused unsympathetic outcomes from a review. On the whole, we conclude that there are no significant flaws in the current review system which require immediate rectification and we acknowledge the value of the review process to the institutes themselves.

67. The exception to this rule of course is found in cases where reviews lead to major changes in an institute's structure or even to its closure and which can cause serious difficulties in the relationship between RCIs and the Research Councils. In chapter 7 of this report we discuss examples of where major restructuring has been proposed and general lessons to be learned on how these processes can be better handled. There is also the issue of the number of reviews which are conducted. In addition to the regular five year reviews, these may also arise from the identification of a need by the Research Council for an examination of a particular part of their research portfolio. This was the case with the review that led to the proposals to restructure the NIMR. Then, there are reviews conducted across the whole piece, such as the Costigan review. Each will have cost significant sums of money and taken significant amounts of staff time. It is difficult to identify exact figures but one union has estimated that the BBSRC "has spent well over £250,000 on reviews" (over an unspecified but recent period).[161] Professor Nuttall of CEH told us that "we did not dare estimate what [the recent review process] had cost CEH" but that it would have been more than the £400,000 which the review of the Tyndall Centre had cost them and it would also have taken longer than the Tyndall Centre's 24 months.[162] We recognise that reviews are a necessary part of ensuring that public funds on research are spent in a cost-effective and transparent way. In organising reviews, however, the Research Councils should have regard to adopting processes which maximise efficiency and minimise the cost to RCIs, both in terms of financial cost and staff time.

Role of RCUK

68. RCUK was established in 2002 as an umbrella organisation representing all eight Research Councils. When asked about its role in monitoring and improving the effectiveness of Research Council support for RCIs, RCUK was adamant that "it would not be appropriate for RCUK to be engaged in monitoring the scientific effectiveness of RCIs".[163] Instead, it referred us to its involvement in relation to producing the large facilities roadmap, the RCUK Efficiency Delivery Project and the Research Councils shared service centre initiative.[164] With the exception of the large facilities roadmap to which we shall return, we note that whilst these are all important administrative roles, they are not central to the work of the RCIs. Indeed, Professor Crute, when asked whether RCUK were taking the lead at the moment in sharing best practice, for example, told us "we are looking to this shared service centre, which, again, is nothing much to do with the day-to-day delivery of science but is very much to do with best practice from the point of view of efficiency".[165]

69. There have been calls for RCUK to take a more active role in oversight of RCIs. For example, the University of Leeds called for RCUK to "play a role in monitoring the regular review of activities, assessment of research quality and strategic direction to maintain international competitiveness" and to "play a monitoring role in ensuring sufficient funding for maintenance of infrastructure and training provision for PhD students and for overall best practice".[166] The Biosciences Federation, on the other hand, believed that "RCUK should provide coherence to the rationales and standards by which RCIs are established and monitored as well as ensuring that adequate support is provided to each RCI".[167] A similar view was expressed by the director of the Tyndall Centre who told us that where it was necessary to lead the process of establishing decision-making mechanisms for cross-council decisions, "that level of oversight and monitoring and leadership from RCUK seems appropriate rather than the individual research council".[168]

70. Giving more powers or responsibilities to RCUK in this area would not be popular with the Research Councils themselves. Of the seven Councils who submitted evidence to us, only one—BBSRC—responded to this element of our terms of reference, and then only to tell us that "The BBSRC believes that the BBSRC Council is the appropriate body to review the effectiveness of the BBSRC's support for its sponsored institutes".[169] This immediately raises the question of who is responsible for oversight of the Council itself, and the answer here is not RCUK. On the whole, however, although we recognise the need for greater oversight of the work of the Research Councils in relation to their RCIs, we accept that RCUK does not have the resources or authority to carry out such a task adequately. Nevertheless, we believe that RCUK could play a greater role in the harmonisation of best practice of the work of the Research Councils in relation to their RCIs through establishing similar mechanisms to those used for knowledge transfer in the wider Research Council context, and we recommend that these possibilities be explored.

Government influence

71. Government departments are key stakeholders in RCIs because the institutes provide them with expertise which cannot be obtained elsewhere. It is therefore strongly in the Government's interests to ensure that its needs are recognised in the long-term strategies of individual institutes and that changes in these needs are communicated as clearly and efficiently as possible. BBSRC, MRC and NERC each submitted evidence setting out the processes that are in place to ensure that RCIs are aware of the policy requirements of government departments when forward-planning. These consist mainly of cross-representation on a wide range of governing bodies and steering or advisory groups, as well as contacts between officials.[170] In addition, NERC has recently instigated a fortnightly internal bulletin "to alert NERC staff, including those in its institutes, to relevant developments in government, such as new strategies or policy needs, and to upcoming bilateral meetings and their outputs".[171]

72. Research Councils and RCIs therefore seem to have the arrangements which would enable them to listen carefully and to respond to Government needs in planning their programmes, but we heard evidence that those needs were, in certain cases, not well articulated by the departments. Once again, the prime example is Defra which finally published its new Evidence and Innovation Strategy last October, over two years after the project to assess the department's evidence and innovation needs had begun.[172] Together with funding difficulties which have delayed decisions on support for science programmes, Defra's dilatoriness has caused difficulties for the institutes which are supposed to work closely with Defra to implement the department's strategy and which are dependent upon departmental contracts and funding. Professor Shirley of IAH explained that "as an institute I think that we do suffer from a lack of clear decision from a department like Defra" and that this "does make planning of some areas of science, increasingly greater areas of science, very difficult".[173] He was supported in this complaint by BBSRC who argued that "it is important that departments such as Defra have a clear policy direction to ensure co-ordinated planning. Without this BBSRC-sponsored institutes have to make short-term decisions which will not necessarily be in the interests of the UK science base."[174]

73. We are concerned about the impact upon institutes of a failure by a Government department to develop and articulate its research strategy. It is right that departments should have an input into the planning processes of RCIs, given the work which those institutes perform for the departments, but in return, it is the responsibility of the departments to set out clearly their research needs in good time for the institutes to be able to act upon them. Professor Sir Keith O'Nions of the OSI told us:

"I think an Institute needs a planning horizon extending for three to five years. It is fully understandable that priorities in research change within a government department—I think we accept that—but we do need clear indicators of what the requirements may be of an Institute over a period of three to five years because there may well be knock-on effects of reprioritisation and we need to be able to plan for them carefully."[175]

We strongly agree. Government departments must undertake to give as full and as early notice as possible to RCIs of their likely research requirements over a three to five year period in order that the institutes may be able to fulfil the nationally-strategic role expected of them.

Co-ordination

74. During this inquiry we received evidence from the British Ecological Society which criticised the lack of a "mechanism for ensuring that Research Councils take a joined-up strategic approach to RCIs".[176] In particular, the Society identified a need for a "more coherent strategy between Defra and NERC to ensure that the UK's strategic scientific infrastructure is not undermined by current funding structures".[177] Professor Crute of IGER made a similar call for:

"a much better dialogue, which is a regular dialogue between Research Councils and between government departments—not just Defra but other departments as well—that rely upon Research Councils and their institutes to deliver things which are of policy importance, so that we can vision the future and make sure we do not have these gaps opening up where we can lose expertise or we have to bridge for long periods."[178]

This need for a more strategic approach to the work of RCIs on the part of all funders was also identified by the Research Council Chief Executives, including Professor Blakemore who told us that "one of the areas of discussion and consultation we are now carrying out in the context of the proposals for a single fund for health research is around the issue of how the intramural programme [RCIs] might be more responsive to policy needs and questions within the health service".[179] His counterpart at BBSRC agreed with his observations[180] and Professor Thorpe from NERC also impressed upon us that:

"we see an important role for us to discuss with government departments such as Defra in terms of their long term thinking on strategy as we develop our science strategy. I am increasingly trying to maintain and enhance dialogue in terms of the forward look of what might be needed in the near future. We know there is a lot of the legislation, for example, that is coming from Europe et cetera in the environmental sciences and that is something we need to be ready for. I would like to see us having a good collaborative way forward in terms of devising those strategies."[181]

75. There are a number of mechanisms available to co-ordinate policy towards RCIs at a more detailed level. For example, in the environmental area, there are strategic forums such as the Global Environment Change Committee and the Environmental Research Funders Forum. There are also departmental bodies such as Defra's Science Advisory Council. Of these, the Environmental Research Funders Forum was singled out by witnesses as a mechanism which "provides us [NERC] with an element of strategic long-term thinking about trends" (Professor Thorpe).[182] It was also praised by Professor Dalton in his upbeat account of Defra's attempts to introduce "joined-up thinking between the research councils and Government departments": "the Environmental Research Funders' Forum … has done a very good job in trying to identify where all those gaps are so that we can then plug those gaps and do something about them".[183]

76. We were very interested to hear such positive feedback on the role of the Environmental Research Funders Forum (ERFF). As NERC describes it:

"The ERFF brings together the UK's major public sector sponsors of environmental science, aiming to make best possible use of funding. ERFF concentrates on activities that: clearly add value; could not be done by a single member acting alone; and have the potential to advance environmental research in the UK and internationally."[184]

It may be that such a forum is particularly appropriate to work in the environmental sciences but it would be worth exploring whether similar forums would be useful in other scientific areas. We recommend that the OSI take the lead in examining the benefits of establishing similar bodies to the Environmental Research Funders Forum in other areas to ensure that Research Councils and Government departments and others work together in devising strategies for the work to be undertaken by RCIs and the public sector research base.

77. However, we also perceive a need for an overarching strategic forum in which priorities for the RCIs and their role in maintaining the UK research and skills base could be explored with all interested parties. This would build a greater understanding of the part played by the facilities and capacities maintained by the RCIs in likely future policy developments, including datasets, laboratories, unfashionable science programmes and, of course, individual expertise. It could also begin to address the vital questions articulated by Professor Hulme of the Tyndall Centre: "How those strategic priorities are decided—should it be left to individual research councils to decide, should it be RCUK that decides, should it actually be a science minister or whoever that decides, or even this committee? Who is actually arguing for what are the national, strategic research capabilities?"[185] We are not advocating any diminution of the relationship between RCIs and their Research Councils, nor any restrictions on the flexibility of institutes to respond to perceived needs. Rather, we wish to see a mechanism whereby the national, and the Government's, interests can be clearly conveyed to the Research Councils and their RCIs, and the threats to those interests as foreseen by the RCIs can be conveyed back. The responsibility for ensuring such dialogue would most readily appear to fall upon the OSI within its remit to oversee the health of the UK science base. We recommend that the OSI be given formal responsibility for developing a mechanism for better two-way dialogue between the Government departments and the RCI sector and their parent Councils in order to improve co-ordination of the strategic direction of RCIs and to protect national scientific capabilities in strategically important areas.

110   Q 149 Back

111   Q 114 Back

112   ibid Back

113   Q 115 Back

114   Q 73 Back

115   Q 113 Back

116   Q 73 Back

117   Ev 99 Back

118   Ibid Back

119   Qq 145-6 Back

120   Ev 102 Back

121   Ev 110  Back

122   Ev 114 Back

123   Ev 118 Back

124   Ev 126 Back

125   Q 4 Back

126   Q 6 Back

127   ibid Back

128   Q 75 Back

129   Q 7 Back

130   Q 149 Back

131   Q 118 Back

132   Q 166 Back

133   Q 258 Back

134   Q 253 Back

135   Q 151 Back

136   Ev 98 Back

137   Q 87 Back

138   ibid Back

139   Q 90 Back

140   Ev 102 Back

141   Ev 78 Back

142   Ev 112 Back

143   Ev 82 Back

144   Ev 150 Back

145   Q 156 Back

146   Q 155 Back

147   Ev 92 Back

148   Ev 142 Back

149   Quinquennial Review of the Grant Awarding Research Councils, OSI, 2001, 3.15-3.17, http://www.rcuk.ac.uk/cmsweb/downloads/rcuk/publications/qqr-s2.pdf Back

150   Ibid, 3.17 Back

151   Ibid Back

152   Ev 82 Back

153   Q 46 Back

154   Q 46 Back

155   Q 48 Back

156   Ibid Back

157   Q 153 Back

158   Ibid Back

159   Ibid Back

160   Ibid Back

161   Ev 156 Back

162   Q 258 Back

163   Ev 112 Back

164   Ev 112-3 Back

165   Q 156 Back

166   Ev 82 Back

167   Ev 100 Back

168   Q 255 Back

169   Ev 121 Back

170   Ev 162, 164, 166 Back

171   Ev 167 Back

172   Ev 171-2 Back

173   Q 157 Back

174   Ev 162 Back

175   Q 418 Back

176   Ev 83 Back

177   Ev 85 Back

178   Q 158 Back

179   Q 43 Back

180   Q 43 Back

181   Q 11 Back

182   Q 68 Back

183   Qq 229-230 Back

184   Ev 142 Back

185   Q 260 Back