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Surveys and interviews confirmed that the FPs have had the biggest impact on participants’ international relationships and their knowledge of a given field. Researcher benefits also include a long list of other welcome achievements, from increased scientific reputation internationally (an organisation’s visibility and competitive position) to an improved ability to attract and retain worldclass researchers. More instrumental outcomes – new tools and methods, products / processes, policies, etc, are much less widely reported – and wider impacts on researcher careers, government policies and business competitiveness are only rarely cited. In this sense, the FP looks very similar to any other applied research programme.

It is quite possible however that the broadband data collection methods used here will tend to under- represent the significance of the outcomes, where a much more time-consuming and costly ethnographic study might reveal a very different picture. The more in-depth exploration of policy outcomes did reveal more than 50 instances where UK based participants, from the 1,200 that replied to the survey, cited very specific contributions to policy documents, directives and operational standards.

Members of the programme management committees, and their national contact points, have a very poor view of the specific outcomes. Most could only talk in very general terms, and stated that the principal benefits tended to revolve around enhanced international friendships and visibility (beyond the very obvious funds with which to conduct research). Several contributors reported researchers becoming more open minded with respect to their preferred approach to things or indeed their key

references as regards seminal work or leading centres of excellence. FP was thought to broaden and enrich people’s outlook, too.

It is hard to imagine that successful participation in FP projects would not improve a person’s ability to collaborate with academics in other countries and disciplines and with other types of organisation more generally. The participant survey suggested that this is indeed the case, with 45% of all respondents stating that the experience had a large, positive impact on their ability to work successfully with universities or businesses in other countries.

All stakeholders similarly took the view that the FP was sufficiently large and special to have had a positive impact on the nature and extent of collaboration between the UK academic and industrial communities and their counterparts abroad. No one had a view on the extent of knowledge and technology transfer enabled through these relationships.

8.7 Impacts and instruments

On balance, it seems that UK stakeholders value two things above all else from amongst the FP’s portfolio of instruments: they like the scale and international scope of the work that can be supported through a Framework scheme; and they like the growing number of bottom-up instruments that permit stakeholders – whether policy makers, research councils or businesses – to get involved in programme- or project-scale activities that fit their priorities exactly. The addition of the ERC was also very widely endorsed, although not by businesses or RTOs who see this as a major financial and intellectual distraction from Europe’s competitiveness issues.

Contributors had very different levels of knowledge regarding the panoply of FP instruments, so for example, the ERC uses just two instruments, neither of which is deployed anywhere else in the FP. Similarly, the research infrastructure area has a single instrument, the I3s, which is not used anywhere else. The other point that emerged was that for every two or three plaudits given to an instrument, we found a detractor able to make a strong case regarding its limitations.

The integrated projects were well regarded by most, permitting a scale of collaborative-research activity not easily replicated through national schemes, and with the added advantage of accessing unique competences and more extensive value chains. The scale and scope permitted was believed to be really important to people’s ambitions to move forward a research agenda. People noted certain risks inasmuch as these very large projects and consortia are hugely difficult to manage and can sometimes dissemble.

The Networks of Excellence generated few comments, as they have largely run their course, however a minority of contributors did offer the view that this kind of partnership-building and knowledge- sharing structure should have been hugely valuable for progressing the ERA and for helping to address the FP ‘Achilles heel,’ demonstration and exploitation.

The ERC Starting Grant has proved to be particularly attractive, and providing a very substantial additional ‘fellowship’ fund for early-career researchers as compared with the national schemes on offer through various research councils. While there are very many national schemes, most are small and competition is fierce. The ERC is a welcome boost in terms of the volume of funding available, and should ensure the UK research base is able to retain a larger proportion of the very best people in research careers. Attrition levels amongst young researchers are perhaps too high, and while this does focus the mind (on excellence) it might also be said to be somewhat wasteful of training and talent. Marie Curie Actions are well regarded and are seen as a valuable source of additional capacity as busy UK labs struggle with the limited numbers of fellowships available nationally. MCAs really only confront two challenges, the first being from industry, and the eligibility rules, which essentially exclude them, and the second being from university HR people who perceive an inflationary pressure on researcher wages as MCA allowances are very much more generous than a typical stipend.

The I3s have worked well, providing large numbers of UK academics with access to a long list of novel and interesting facilities that is not readily available nationally. The STFC was also complimentary about the role of the I3s in helping Europe’s scientific communities to have more extensive dialogue around common needs, outside FP.

Government departments tended to favour the ERANETs above all else, and in particular the ERANET plus scheme, as this approach permits policy teams or industry-sponsorship groups to define research

agendas and funding levels. This was not a universal view however, and at least two of the research councils expressed concerns over the protracted process through which partners exchange information and negotiate a common agenda.