Member Briefing – June/July
SECTION 1: SCIENCE AND RESEARCH BASE
HEFCE Announce New Support Element for Charities Research Income
HEFCE has now released details for the distribution of the Charitable Research Support Fund which will be allocated to universities on the basis of retrospective returns for their research income from charities (see Circular Letter 16/2005
The new funding will form part of the HEFCE block grant to universities from 2006-7. HEFCE make reference to £575m received for charity research in 2003-4 which we believe is the England figure rather than UK. AMRC has some doubts about the accuracy of this figure and has undertaken some analysis of university accounts, of which more below. However, even if there is some evidence of over-generous reporting of charity research income, charities remain an important part of the research landscape and AMRC members, as a group, are the largest non-government external funders of research in UK higher education.
The Treasury announced the outline for the new funding stream in the 2004 spending review. Treasury set out a rationale for government funding to underpin high quality charitably funded public good research in universities set in a background of partnership between charities and HEIs. The value of the new funding element will be £135 million in 2006-07, and £180 million in 2007-08. In each year £90 million of that funding will come from the element within the mainstream QR grant currently driven by charity income. From 2006-07 the Council will therefore cease counting research charity income as one of the minor volume measures in allocating mainstream QR. The Government intends to invest further in the new element in the period 2008-2010 subject to continued progress by the sector towards financial sustainability.
Allocations from the new element will be made by reference to the total eligible charity research income awarded to institutions:
- in units of assessment rated 4 or above at the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise (RAE).
- in units of assessment rated 3a and 3b receiving funding for Research Capability.
Allocations will not be weighted to reflect RAE ratings above these thresholds.
Three eligibility criteria apply to these allocations:
- Research income which is awarded through open competition, excellence and priority using a method of external peer review.
- Research income which is awarded by a charity registered in the United Kingdom or an overseas body with exclusively charitable purposes, consistent with the definition set out by the Charity Commission for England and Wales.
- In any one year, only the first £500,000 of the annual release from the deferred capital grant account of each capital grant is eligible. This is to avoid unhelpful volatility in allocating the new element. There will be no threshold for recurrent income.
The primary data source for the new element will be the annual Research Activity Survey (RAS) returned by HEIs to HEFCE, which will be revised this year to take account of the criteria outlined above. The allocations for 2007-08, to be announced in the spring of 2007, will be based allocations on the mean income reported in the two most recent RAS returns. For the allocations for 2006-07 to be announced in 2006 data from the 2005 RAS only will be used.
With the help of an US student intern, I have now analysed 8 university reports of their charitable research income. This has raised a number of important questions that will need to be taken into account for the distribution of the new charitable research support funding and in with regard to the way in which universities classify and report their charitable income, both for research and other unrestricted donations.
Our research so far shows, for example, that many universities base their classification on the name of the grant giver (trust, charity, foundation) without verifying whether it is a registered charity or otherwise formally recognised as being for public benefit and some institutions seem to think ‘not-for-profit’ is the same as ‘charitable’ and include some government sources of funding (NHS Trusts, Sure Start, Learning and Skills). A significant proportion of the funding, particularly for the older and larger institutions, comes from charities that will support research only in that institution or one within the control of the host institution itself, though this is not always apparent from the name. Some institutions received significant funds from overseas charities and may be the only UK recipient of these funds: assessing the eligibility of some of the smaller and more unusual sources of funds may therefore be difficult.
AMRC member charities account for a very significant proportion of all charitable research income (averaging around 70%) with other recognised reputable research funders (such as the Leverhulme Trust) very visible across institutions. However, I believe that as much as 25-30%% of the funds included in some university accounts as charitable research will not meet the public good/charity, quality or competitive eligibility tests (use of full peer review). In addition, other accounting variables, such as the inclusion of unrestricted benefactions and donations if they are in the event used for research, the inclusion of ‘consultancy’ contracts with an IP element on the basis that there will be an element of ‘research’, and inclusion of ‘depreciation’ against charitably funded buildings may also have an impact on the overall level of eligible charitable funding. The Treasury eligibility guidelines included the requirement for the research funder to have a strategy but this seems to have slipped from HEFCE’s criteria.
AMRC will be meeting with HEFCE in the next few weeks to discuss progress and details of how the scheme will work in practice, but our analysis so far suggests that HEFCE may need to provide universities with much clearer guidance as to eligible sources and types of funding. Over the next few weeks I plan to continue our analysis and produce a report.
Diana Garnham
RAE2008
The Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) is the method used to assess research quality in UK universities and the results are used by the Funding Councils to distribute the block grant which supports research activity in universities. Although the next exercise is not taking place until 2008, preparations are well underway in drawing up criteria to be used by the judging panels in making decisions about how best to judge the range of research that they will see. Leslie Turnberg, Diana Garnham and Lee-Ann Coleman have been invited to sit as AMRC observers on the three main panels dealing with medical and health-related research.
A consultation on the draft criteria and working methods of RAE panels is currently underway and the relevant documents are available at: Responses to the consultation are required by midday 19 September and AMRC will collate any responses from members for submission. Areas that AMRC has paid particular attention to in the lead up to the publication of the draft criteria include the assessment of applied and practice-based research and indicators of esteem which would recognise contributions to the charity sector. AMRC will issue more information to members shortly, but if any members have particular issues that they wish to raise, please let me know.
Lee-Ann Coleman
Human Tissue Authority (HTA) – consultation on codes of practice
The HTA has been established under the Human Tissue Act and will be the regulating authority for matters relating anatomical and port-mortem examinations, transplantations and the storage of human material for education, training and research. A board of sixteen has been appointed with a wide range of experience and representing a variety of lay and professional groups. The board is chaired by The Rt Hon Baroness Hayman, previously Chairman of Cancer Research UK and who many from AMRC member charities will know.
One of the functions of the HTA is to issue codes of practice and it has now presented draft codes of conduct covering five of the areas within its remit for consultation. These cover the areas of:
- Consent
- Donation of organs, tissues and cells for transplantation
- Post mortem examination
- Anatomical examinations
- Removal/collection, retention and disposal of human organs and tissue
The consultation period lasts until 4 October and AMRC intends to respond on behalf of members. The HTA now has a web site at and the draft codes of conduct are available to view there. AMRC will be contacting members with further information about the consultation shortly.
Lee-Ann Coleman
Fixed-term Contracts
Fixed-term contracts for research staff have been an issue in the university sector for some time. The Independent Review of Higher Education Pay & Conditions (commonly known as the Bett Report), was published in 1999 and it made recommendations that universities should reduce their reliance on fixed term contracts, as well as improve their conditions of employment. Although some initiatives were put in place to address the career concerns of this group of people, most were aimed at offering further sources of information and advice for planning their next post (which would often be another fixed-term contract).
In October 2002, EU fixed-term employee regulations were implemented in the UK and provided the necessary incentive to employers to ensure that appropriate measures were in place. Employers are now obliged to offer equivalent treatment to staff on fixed-term contracts and to limit the use of these types of contracts. Those on fixed-term contracts for four years or more must be offered a permanent contract (unless there is an objective justification) and if there is a justification, they are entitled to redundancy pay. The fact that an employee is paid on a grant which is for a fixed period is not sufficient justification to offer them a fixed-term contract.
The AUT gives an overview of what this means on their site:
What does this mean for AMRC members? As more universities undertake the process of reviewing fixed-term contracts, questions may arise about the cost implications. These are the responsibility of the employer, which for most funders means the university. The expectation would be that any contract of employment issued by the employer should be in compliance with relevant laws and regulations. Most charities would expect universities to cover these costs from their block grant (and with the introduction of an explicit stream of funding to support charity research in universities) charities would expect universities to use this money to cover the full costs of projects that they fund.
Lee-Ann Coleman
SECTION 2: CHARITY SECTOR
Universities to be Regulated as Charities - Charities Bill Update
The Charities Bill has been represented to Parliament following the election and had its Second Reading in the House of Lords on 7th June. The revised Bill has 160 amendments on the earlier version that the Government has included following the Committee Stage debates in the House of Lords
With regard to the areas of interest to AMRC, most of the Bill remains unchanged or tidied up. However, the proposals regarding exempt charities have been explored in much more detail and three options have been proposed: do nothing, the Charity Commission as a regulator for all or establishing a principal regulator for some. The Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) regards the status quo as not an option stating “A failure on the part of the Government to address the lack of regulation for exempt charities would give rise to serious complaint from the very large number of charities who are required to register with the Commission”. It goes onto report that the second option would be the most straightforward and would require no secondary legislation but may produce the greatest regulatory burden. However, it looks most likely that exempt charities will be regulated but not registered as the report refers to the need for all charities to be properly accountable and that in the current situation exempt charities “do not have to demonstrate that they continue to merit the considerable benefits, both fiscal and in terms of public esteem, which flow from having charitable status”. The Home Office has set out the key principles of charity regulation that proposed principle regulators would have to achieve which include: having the objective of ensuring that the charity complies with all relevant legal requirements (including fundraising) and that the charity provides to all stakeholders adequate financial information about the use and application of the resources entrusted to it.
There are some excellent explanatory notes to the Bill this time and more details on the RIA at
Diana Garnham
Civil Renewal and Active Citizenship – a Guide to the Debate
AMRChas received a copy of this NCVO publication which aims to introduce voluntary sector organisations to the concepts of civil renewal and active citizenship and the current debate around them. Although this publication is probably more relevant for charities involved in community work and service delivery, we thought you might appreciate a brief outline of what it covers.
The reportoutlinesthe various definitions of the above terms and summarising the Government’s interest in them.The voluntary and community sector is seen as having a key role to play in driving the Government’s agenda for promoting thesewhich explains NCVO’s interest in the debate. Summaries of the various sections and concepts discussed are accompanied by lists of questions that these issues raise for the voluntary sector.
The perspectives of the voluntary and community sector are brought in the third chapter. These included criticism of the Government’s tendency to focus too much on the delivery of public services, and of its narrow view of “active citizenship.” Finally, participants felt that the voluntary and community sector did offer opportunities for meaningful civil renewal, with the last chapter proposing a much wider definition of the term than that given by the Government, and highlighting the need to ensure that the autonomy of the voluntary and community sector, and of society, was preserved.
Tina Chimombo
SECTION 3: SERVICES TO MEMBERS
Dates for the Diary
This year’s AGM will be held on the previously proposed date of Wednesday, 12th October at the British Medical Association, London. Further details will be posted on the AMRC website and circulated to members in due course.
The date for the next residential meeting has also been set and will be held on Thursday, 23rd and Friday, 24th March 2006 (venue tbc). The programme will consist of presentations from guest speakers and updates to members onissues relevant to the sector as well as workshops on current matters.
Training
AMRC held its new ‘Advancing Peer Review’ on 7 July. As you will all know, this was the day of the London bombings. Amazingly many of those registered did manage to arrive for the seminar, including the two speakers from out of town. Fortunately no one attending or trying to attend the day was affected more directly apart from encountering the severe disruption on all forms of public transport that occurred that day. Our afternoon speaker, a researcher from the British Medical Journal, was in the BMA building at the time the bomb on the bus exploded. Although she and her colleagues were unhurt it was a very distressing experience and they had to evacuate the building. Those who did arrive for the seminar decided to stay and contributed in a very positive way, despite the circumstances. A big thank you to all of you.
The last two seminars for the year aimed at Grant Managers and Administrators are:
20 October Dissemination of research findings
24 NovemberManaging the outcomes of research
Both of these will seminars will cover increasingly important areas for grant administrators and managers and should be interesting and thought-provoking days. Places are still available so please book yours using the booking form available on the web site at:
Members Update Meeting 8 September - UK Clinical Research Agenda
A number of exciting developments are happening in clinical research with new commitments from the Department of Health, the establishment of the UK Clinical Research Collaboration (UK CRC) and the increasing involvement of patients in research. This event provides the opportunity for staff from AMRC member charities to be updated on developments from two of the lead players: Sally Davies, Director of Research and Development, Department of Health andLiam O'Toole, Chief Executive of the UK CRC.
The Members Update event is taking place from 4:00 – 7:00 p.m. at the WellcomeTrustBuilding, 215 Euston Road, London. Refreshments will be provided and there will be plenty of opportunity for catching up with colleagues. There is a cost of £25 to cover expenses. Places are filling up fast, so please complete a booking form (available from the web site at: to reserve your place.