2023–24 Pre-Budget Submission

This pre-Budget submission to the Australian Government ahead of the May 2023 Budget maintains that Australia’s health and medical research is world-leading but that current investment is inadequate, poorly aligned and fragmented along the pipeline from discovery to product. Research Australia’s central proposal is a National Medical Products Industry Plan, guiding the $1.5 billion Medical Products sub-fund of the National Reconstruction Fund, with a goal of Australia becoming a net exporter of pharmaceuticals by 2035 and similar targets for diagnostics and devices; it notes Australia ranked 23rd among pharmaceutical exporters in 2019, with exports of US$3.2 billion against imports of US$7.38 billion. Other recommendations are a national stocktake of health and medical research and innovation funding to reduce duplication and gaps; a national research and innovation workforce plan supporting circular mobility between academia and industry, noting that 54% of university and 74% of medical research institute researchers are on contracts; real increases of at least 2% a year for National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and Australian Research Council research programs and for the Research Support Program, whose ratio to direct research income fell from 46.4% to 38.3% between 2010 and 2020; a new Independent Research Institutes Infrastructure Support Scheme stream to cover indirect costs of Medical Research Future Fund grants; a lottery-based clinician researcher fellowship scheme funding two or three research days a week for five years; and lifting Australian Government research and development spending to at least 0.75% of GDP.