Laudatory comments have already been released by the Group of Eight, Federation of Scientific and Technological Societies (FASTS) and the Australian Vice-Chancellors' Committee.

AVCC President Professor Gerard Sutton said, "Importantly, the report recognises that research not only provides positive economic benefits, but also substantial social and environmental dividends. It stands to reason, therefore, that the nation would get an even better return if it was prepared to invest more on research. For example, we believe there is a clear case for an increase in the block grants to universities to support research infrastructure." And the AVCC was appreciative of the commission's recognition of the difficulties associated with current “proof-of-concept” commercial arrangements for research within universities, and the need to provide universities with additional funding to help them demonstrate promising technologies so that they could more easily be commercialised.

The Chairman of the Group of Eight, Melbourne University Vice-Chancellor Glyn Davis, said the report, "...provides an insightful analysis of the current contribution of university research to the economic, social and environmental wealth of the nation." He noted that the commission has recognized the importance of basic research in the innovation cycle and added, "Importantly the report identifies problems with the current structure of university research funding and notes the risks to ‘meaningful strategic choices at the institutional level’."

Professor Davis then brought up the place of the Federal Government's proposed Research Quality Framework. "We agree with the Productivity Commission’s findings that the proposed Research Quality Framework has some benefits. We do need to review the current measures of research excellence. However it is very important that any new research assessment model is robust and tested to ensure it is accurate and cost-effective before implementation. It will be difficult to achieve this in the proposed 2008 implementation time-frame. The suggestion in the report that the RQF be delayed while other options are explored has our strong endorsement."

The President of FASTS, Professor Tom Spurling said, "The report does us all the considerable service of stating the obvious; that a major benefit of public support for science and innovation is ensuring national preparedness for emerging economic, social and environmental challenges such as climate change, drought or low carbon energy.," and emphasised the commission's "key message that the current pressure on universities and public research agencies like CSIRO to pursue a narrow view of commercialisation understates the crucial social benefits that science provides through identifying, understanding and minimising risks.”

Professor Spurling also pointed out, the commission’s "finding that the Co-operative Research Centres (CRC) program should be improved by reinstating the original policy objectives of translating research into broad social, environmental and economic benefits rather than a focusing of public support on industrial research alone," and he concluded, "The Commission is right to question the value of public sector research doing the job of industry R&D especially if there aren’t the business receptors for such research. Rethinking how best to encourage industry R&D though improvements to the tax concession and more agile CRC-type arrangements are important and sensible suggestions."

Not surprisingly all commentators point out that the 700 pages will require additional careful assessment before they will make definitive comment.

The Minister for Education, Science and Training as well as the Chief Scientist are yet to comment publicly.