The UK must maintain a broad range of research capabilities and continue to prioritise excellence in blue-skies funding decisions, says a new report.

The 66-page ¡°Vision for UK Research¡±, published today by the Council of Science and Technology, argues that the Government needs to adopt a ¡°clear long-term vision¡±, both for the way it supports the research base and the way it derives benefits from it. It argues that failure to do so could lead to UK research ¡°undergoing either managed or neglected decline¡±.

The report also says that in the longer term the Government needs to rethink the structure of masters degrees and PhDs, recommending a move to four-year PhD programmes, with the first one or two years leading to a masters qualification.

The council says that the need for a new vision is paramount in light of the pressure on public spending and growing global competition.

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To avoid decline, it says the UK ¡°must maintain capability across the research base¡±.

¡°The aim should be to ensure a broad range of excellent upstream [blue skies] research¡±, it says, the outcomes of which ¡°are highly uncertain and often unknowable¡±. It adds that ¡°attempts at upstream prioritisation on the basis of projected impacts are not feasible¡±.

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The report also says that supporting ¡°excellence wherever it is found¡± should remain the mantra of funding bodies.

¡°Funders of upstream research should be ruthless about excellence as the overriding criterion for funding prioritisation,¡± it says.

However, it acknowledges that more needs to be done to derive wider benefits from research results.

The council also argues for a rethink of the language used to describe research.

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The terminology in current use, such as ¡°pure¡±, ¡°blue skies¡± and ¡°applied¡± research, ¡°causes problems and division amongst the research community¡±, the report says. It adds that phrases such as ¡°curiosity-driven research¡± can be ¡°misleading and damaging¡±.

A ¡°looser language¡± which reflects the relationship ¡°between research and social and economic benefits¡± is needed, it says.

zoe.corbyn@tsleducation.com