News & Views item - November 2007

 

Research Grant On-Costs US Style. (November 16, 2007)

One of the most significant factors negatively effecting basic research in Australia is the appreciation by the granting agencies of the expenses entailed by universities and research institutes in supporting researchers who are awarded grants to further their investigations.

 

The Australian Research Council sets on-costs at 28% of the discovery grant awarded.

 

The short article below is taken from this week's Science and ought to give pause to our federal law makers. Unfortunately there's no sign of it.

 


 

New Limits on Defense Grants
U.S. lawmakers last week put the squeeze on universities that receive basic-research grants from the military by tightening the amount of money that universities can be reimbursed for the cost of facilitating that research. The new language limits overhead costs to 35% of the total amount of the grant. That's the equivalent of a 54% indirect cost rate, and many schools won't notice the difference because their rates do not exceed that amount.

But Barry Toiv of the Association of American Universities says at least 40 universities could be affected by the decision, and lobbyists fear that Congress might eventually apply the same formula to the government's entire research portfolio. "A cap on reimbursement is a first step down a potentially slippery slope," says Toiv. "Preventing universities from reimbursing all the real and necessary costs of conducting research will discourage them from applying for defense grants."

 

Today, the Executive Director of the Group of Eight, Michael Gallagher said: "A key policy challenge facing Australia’s research system [is] the inability of current funding mechanisms to cover the full cost of research under our various national competitive grant schemes. There has been strong growth in funding for competitive schemes over the last five years, but in most cases, every time an institution wins, it is effectively penalised by having to find funds from other sources to cover the full costs. The Go8 urges the incoming Government to seriously consider shifting to a funding model that covers the full cost of research supported by competitive schemes - as is now the policy in the UK."

Dr Gallagher might have added, "and has been the practice in the US for decades".