Universities Accord: Response to the Discussion Paper

This submission to the Australian Universities Accord Expert Panel responds to discussion paper questions 27 and 38, on research training and employment practices, and question 47, on the structure of Commonwealth higher education funding. On early and mid-career researchers, Research Australia links insecure employment to poor preparation for careers outside academia, citing its 2020 survey in which 65.5% of early career researchers were on fixed-term contracts and 10.5% casual, most commonly for 12 months, and explaining how project-based grant funding leaves no one responsible for researchers’ career development. It recommends that the Accord treat job security, career progression and professional development as a shared responsibility of funders, universities, researcher managers and researchers, using the UK Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers as a model, and that programs offering placements in industry, government and not-for-profits be expanded. On indirect costs, it traces the unmet 2009 commitment to approach 50 cents per competitive grant dollar and the shift of Research Block Grants towards rewarding industry engagement, noting Australian Bureau of Statistics data showing discovery research falling from 25% of university research expenditure in 2010 to 19.4% in 2020, a decline of $314 million between 2018 and 2020. It proposes two principles: the Commonwealth should fund the full direct costs and a fair share of the indirect costs of research it sponsors, at an agreed ratio, and should support indirect costs of industry and other research from a separate pool. It also asks that the balance between public good and industry research be considered in research infrastructure funding.