Universities need to stop pretending every dollar being spent on research is going towards critical projects, former Productivity Commission chairman Michael Brennan says, and vice chancellors need to be more realistic in the claims they make to policymakers about research funding.

The former adviser to the Coalition turned chief executive of economic think tank e61 Institute said some claims – such as asserting a project would return $4 for every $1 put in – were “completely overblown” and “treated as nonsense by the policy community”.