Research funding is ‘too complex’, inquiry finds

Australia’s system for allocating grants for research needs simplifying, a parliamentary inquiry has found.

Liberal MP Andrew Laming who chairs the House of Representatives Committee for Employment, Education and Training. Picture: AAP

A federal parliamentary committee has called for simplification of commonwealth research funding following an inquiry that revealed the high level of complexity and cost in Australia’s research grant application system.

The inquiry, headed by Liberal MP Andrew Laming who chairs the House of Representatives Committee for Employment, Education and Training, also recommended a new fund to help translate non-medical research into commercial applications.

The committee was told by one eminent researcher, Frank Gannon, that compared with Europe Australia’s research grant funding system was “incredibly complex”, “counter-productive” and a “burden”. “I think we’ve got ourselves, in Australia, into a quagmire of making sure that we address the paperwork rather than the problems we’re really trying to address,” Professor Gannon, who heads the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Brisbane, told the committee.

The committee was told that processes for managing research grants after they were awarded were also unnecessarily onerous.

It its report the committee called for a “single, whole-of-government online system for all commonwealth grant appli­cations and post-award management”.

To reduce the burden on researchers and cost to univer­sities of the current lengthy and detailed applications process, the committee recommended a two-stage process with the first requiring less detail and only successful applicants being required to submit a full proposal with budgeting.

It also called for the expensive and complex Excellence in Research in Australia evaluation of university research to be conducted every five years instead of three to save costs.

The committee also recommended that TAFE colleges be permitted to compete for research grants and that there should be more support for early and mid-career researchers.

The report noted the low level of collaboration between industry and the researchers who worked in universities and other research organisations.

It suggested that the federal government look at creating a public portal — similar to one run by the European Commission — to help create these partnerships.

Universities Australia chief executive Catriona Jackson welcomed the recommendations, which will reduce the red tape in grant applications.

“At the moment, researchers are overly burdened with continual applications and reporting which eats into the precious time that they have available to chase cures, breakthroughs and insights,” she said.

“In any one year, Australia’s university researchers collectively spend more than 500 working years on writing applications for just one of the major national grants schemes.”