It has been four years now since that review was published and still there has been no increase in funding from the Welsh Government to bring it in line with the rest of the United Kingdom. How can our universities compete when we continue to invest less in them than Scotland or England?

We're all competing for the same funding streams, but Wales is at a significant disadvantage—a disadvantage caused by a real-terms disinvestment in our universities. Research in Wales has historically relied on European Union funding, but even with EU funding Wales was still at a disadvantage compared to other UK nations because of Welsh Government's low levels of investment in infrastructure. 

In that 2018 Reid review, commissioned by the Welsh Government, it pointed out that EU funding streams at that time should be replaced with the Welsh Government funding ones instead. This would support success in UK-wide funding competitions and attract high levels of business investment. But this recommendation has still not been implemented.

The Higher Education Funding Council for Wales administers infrastructure funding to universities on behalf of the Welsh Government. Their budget for 2022-23 was £81.7 million. Pro rata, if Welsh universities were supported to compete with England, funding in Wales would be around £100 million. That's a shortfall of £18 million in funding for crucial infrastructure. That shortfall means that Welsh universities do not have the vital infrastructure they need and are simply unable to compete with other universities across the UK for funding. That dramatically reduces the number of grants coming into Wales and limits the potential benefits to the Welsh economy from research and development. 

Medical research is a prime example of that. Medical research not only saves lives in the future but it fuels our economy now, and the people of Wales agree: British Heart Foundation Cymru recently reported that an astounding 82 per cent of people in Wales believe that it is important for Wales to be doing medical research. As well as providing a host of benefits to patients, medical research, including charity-funded medical research, is absolutely vital to our economy. Modelling commissioned by the BHF suggests that charity-funded medical research plays a vital role in Wales's economy and also has the potential to drive economic growth.

Research by the Fraser of Allander Institute at the University of Strathclyde estimated that charity funding makes up 35 percent of all third sector and public funding of medical research in Wales, with active research funding of £21 million in 2018. The institute found that, in 2019, medical research funding by charities in Wales supported £86 million-worth of output and £55 million gross value added. 

The institute, commissioned by the British Heart Foundation, also found that every £1 million spent on medical research by charities likely has significantly larger benefits for the economy than the average investment in Wales, making investment in research excellent value for money. Each £1 million spent on medical research funding in Wales by charities supports £2.3 million in output and £1.47 million GVA. Those figures mean that the multipliers of medical research funding in Wales by charities are likely to be comparable to some sectors with the highest GVA multipliers in Wales, making investment in attracting charity-funded medical research to Wales excellent value for money. 

Increases in Government and third sector funded research can also increase private sector funding. Increasing investment by the public sector and third sector by 1 per cent creates nearly the same increase in private sector expenditure within a year. To put it another way, anything the Welsh Government puts in will likely be matched by the industry within a year. 

The British Heart Foundation also reported that charity-funded medical research supports job creation in skilled sectors like education, research and development, health and social work and engineering. These salaries are, obviously, then spent in our local communities, local businesses and local economies. At the moment, charity-funded medical research supports 975 full-time-equivalent jobs in Wales, even with Wales underperforming in attracting research funding. Imagine the benefits if the Welsh Government were to invest and ensure Wales lives up to its potential in attracting that funding to Wales. 

The Institute of Physics are also calling on the Welsh Government to increase quality-related research, QR, funding. Office for National Statistics data shows that QR funding in Wales has not kept pace with inflation since 2008, and the Scottish Government has managed to maintain or increase QR funding in the same time frame. To note, the failure to keep pace with inflation precedes Brexit and debates about the removal of structural funds. They also go on to say that the Welsh Government abolished bespoke funding for innovation and engagement in 2014-15 and the funding was reinstated in 2018-19 at £7.5 million, and is now £15 million per annum. But that is below the £25 million that was recommended in the Reid review commissioned by the Welsh Government.

Their concerns come in part from the findings of a CBI economics survey of physics innovators. It found Wales’s physics innovators collaborate more regularly with universities than innovators in the UK as a whole. With 54 per cent of Wales’s innovators saying improved opportunities to collaborate were a key driver of their plans to increase investment, these partnerships may be central to realising R&D and innovation goals.

Welsh Government should commit to winning at least Wales’s population share of external competitive funding—that is, 5 per cent of external competitive funding in the UK. But to do this, Welsh Government needs to increase its own investment. Welsh universities desperately need to see an uplift to funding for infrastructure provided by Welsh Government. Without the same support as the rest of the UK, Welsh universities and Welsh researchers will be unable to compete on a level playing field for UK-wide funding. We would be missing not only the benefits of medical research, but also an opportunity for economic recovery and economic growth. There is a funding inequality in research in the UK, and I believe it's the duty of the Welsh Government to address it.