Examination of Witnesses (Questions 87-99)
PROFESSOR JOHN
MURPHY, MRS
BARBARA DOIG
AND PROFESSOR
RICHARD BROOK
OBE
29 MARCH 2006
Q87 Chairman: Good morning everyone and
good morning to our expert witnesses. We will ask you, Professor
Murphy, to introduce yourself and your colleagues very briefly
in a second, but perhaps I could say to the assembled throng that
our decision to look at Research Council support for knowledge
transfer was part of a decision taken by the Committee to review
and to scrutinise the work of the Research Councils using a thematic
approach. This was the first of our attempts to do that work and
we felt knowledge transfer was a good way to start because it
did affect every single Research Council. Indeed, the work you
have been doing in terms of your expert panel has been in many
ways leading or mirroring what we have been trying to do as well,
so we are interested in your comments this morning. Professor
Murphy, could you introduce yourself and your colleagues and say
what you have been up to.
Professor Murphy: I am John Murphy,
University Partnerships within BAE Systems. To put that into context,
we have about 60 university partners. We interact a lot with the
university sector. I also chair the CBI's Inter-Company Academic
Relations Group (ICARG).
Mrs Doig: When I was invited to
become a member, I was a senior civil servant in the Scottish
Executive, but I am now working independently as a knowledge broker
in that gap between user community and the various funders of
research. I am also chair of the United Kingdom Social Research
Association.
Professor Brook: Richard Brook.
I am theoretically retired, after a long career in contract research
and development in that gap between academic research and industry.
I am President of the Association of Independent Research and
Technology Organisations. I have been involved with the Research
Councils probably for 25 years and in various universities and
I am in EPSRC's system as a peer reviewer and NERC. In my retirement,
I am involved in raising finance for high-tech early growth companies
and spin-outs, including those from universities.
Q88 Chairman: We are interested as
a committee as to why it took you so long to produce your report.
It was due in January; the draft is only just out. Why?
Professor Murphy: Initially, I
was due to chair it. I then had to pull out for personal reasons,
so I was not involved on the first two days when the presentations
were given by the Research Councils. Co-chairs were put in place.
The initial draft of the report came out around about January.
Part of the initial problem was people getting their heads around
the material that was presented, to try and address the high level
objectives about the scale of impact in knowledge transfer. It
is a combination of things: partly the coherence of the material,
so that people can get their heads around it, but also partly
the availability, if you like, of free resource within a limited
timescale to get some real content in the report. People on the
Panel all have employment elsewhere, so you have to fit this in;
some businesses are not willing to give up the free time, so people
have to do it at evenings and weekends; so it has taken from December
until now to get a report with some real substance in.
Q89 Chairman: Our understanding is
that, whilst that seems to be a very plausible reason for the
delay, you have had problems with RCUK who wanted to edit this
report. Is that true or not?
Professor Murphy: There has been
an element of that, yes.
Q90 Chairman: Should they be doing
that, for an independent report?
Professor Murphy: One of the recommendations
we have put into the report is that it should be more independent,
so it has been managed to a certain extent. But what initially
drove that was the accuracy of facts in the report. We were pressured
to release drafts of the report to the Research Councils. I was
reluctant to do this because I thought it would set too many hares
running, and that is exactly what it did. You need to use an appropriate
turn of language to put the messages across in an appropriate
way, and by seeing early copies of the report, which essentially
just contain information dumps, it just sets too many hares running.
Q91 Chairman: This is now a neutered
report when it comes out.
Professor Murphy: No.
Q92 Chairman: Yes?
Professor Murphy: No. From the
feedback we have got, we have taken account of inaccuracies. In
fairness to the Research Councils, their main feedback has been
of that type. There have been a few elements which, in my view,
tended to steer the findings of the report but we have not allowed
that to happen. I believe, and hopefully the Panel believes, that
there are some strong messages within the report.
Q93 Chairman: Have they not basically
said that you misunderstood the terms of reference and therefore
produced a botched report?
Professor Murphy: I do not think
that is the case, no. There was a slight difference in approach,
in terms of the Research Councils wanting our focus to be on their
detailed activities, which was very difficult in the timescales,
but also the Panel really wanting to address the scale of impact
relating to the high level objectives. Certainly, from my perspective,
to get impact on the UK economy, you have to look at scale not
specific examples, and that is where we struggled.
Q94 Bob Spink: Would it be fair to
say there is tension between RCUK and the Panel?
Professor Murphy: Yes, there has
been tension.
Q95 Bob Spink: You said you were
pressured to release early copies of the report so that they could
comment on it before people saw it.
Professor Murphy: Yes.
Q96 Bob Spink: What form did that
pressure take?
Professor Murphy: Just repeated
requests. As I say, within the limited timescales, to get our
heads around the whole process was really difficult. This was
why, in the end, I backed off, because it was to improve the accuracy
of facts in the report.
Q97 Bob Spink: Prior to the review,
how much guidance did you get from RCUK about your terms of reference,
objectives and methodology?
Professor Murphy: I think it was
just one meeting we had—which was not the whole Panel. Myself
and Alan Driver, the rapporteur, met with them.
Q98 Bob Spink: Who wrote the terms
of reference?
Professor Murphy: RCUK, I believe.
Q99 Bob Spink: Do you believe you
followed them appropriately?
Professor Murphy: We have tried
to follow them, but I think you need to understand that it is
an area that does not have a well-determined boundary around it.
Looking at the higher level objectives around this fuzzy boundary,
I suspect there may be views from the Research Councils that we
have strayed over what they see as the boundary but we think impacts
on the objectives.
Chairman: Could you ask the other witnesses
to comment on your line of questioning?
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