Editorial: Funding research

A radical change to the UK's research funding system is needed.

Is chemistry in the UK better off without the Research Assessment Exercise? In its early days, the RAE did contribute to driving up research standards but the system is no longer working.

The UK's House of Commons Science and Technology Committee recently published a report, following up Sir Gareth Robert's review of the RAE. It commented that 'the RAE has been detrimental to the provision of science and engineering in the UK' and that there is no evidence that the changes proposed for 2008 will remedy this.

The RAE is highly selective and has concentrated research resources at a handful of universities. This has had an effect on the viability of university departments in core subjects, such as chemistry.

Departments that did not perform well enough in past RAEs do not have enough money to invest to do better in later RAEs and are being forced to close. While this is the fault of the funding decisions, rather than the RAE process itself, the two are impossible to decouple.

Despite the problems and opposition, the RAE will go ahead in 2008. While many of the revisions are positive, there are some short term fixes that are essential. Universities will be judged in 2008 on the work they are doing now but they have not been given any guidelines on how the quality profile will be used to calculate funding. This must be provided.

But more radical change is needed. The focus should now be on replacing the system from 2008.

Research funding should be distributed to promote high quality research whether that is academic or applied. This needs to be done in a forward-looking process.

The RAE bases decisions on past performance. This backward looking system is not good at following trends or identifying important areas for future research. Also, if UK taxpayers' money is to be spent on research funding, there should be a strategic input, based on national research priorities.

The Institute for Public Policy Research suggests the RAE is flawed and costly and should be replaced by a system that channels funds through the research councils.

A key argument against this approach has been that some subject areas have no research council, but now that the Arts and Humanities Research Council will be established next year, this should no longer be a concern.

Another worry is that relying on the research councils would incentivise the type of work they tend to support to the detriment of research that is relevant to industry or the public sector. Research councils have also been accused of favouring safe, incremental work. This, however, is also a problem with the RAE as it compels researchers to produce a steady stream of publishable work.

Any proposed alternative should also consider the viability of departments in core subjects, such as chemistry, and the impact any further closures would have.

It is time to acknowledge that the dual support system has collapsed and focus on developing a viable alternative.