Liam Byrne – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Liam Byrne on 2014-04-25.

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, what the cost was of the recent triennial review of the Research Councils.

Mr David Willetts

The cost of the review primarily relates to the salary costs of review team members, who undertook the review as a corporate objective alongside their existing responsibilities. On average, the review team spent around 10% of their weekly core work hours on the review across its duration. There were additional costs associated with the extensive stakeholder engagement and in year awards to review team members to recognise their personal contribution in completing the review. These awards are consistent with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills’ (BIS) In-Year Awards policy of recognising and rewarding contributions to business performance and demonstrating the BIS values.

The estimated maximum total cost to BIS of the review team is £81,350, which represents 0.002% of total Research Council funding.