Published on 16 September 2011
RCUK Final Reports, Notifications and Sanctions
In a recent letter to Oxford University, Research Council UK (RCUK) clarified their position relating to sanctions for late submission of final reports. Please note the following:
- With RCUK's move to the Shared Services Centre, sanctions are applied without the issue of reminder emails
- Sanctions are 20% of the value of the grant for final reports not received within 3 months of the end of the grant
- Sanctions of 100% of the value of the grant may be imposed for final reports not received after 6 months of the end of the grant
- The status reporting in Je-S was temporarily malfunctioning, so some historic data has not yet been updated/corrected in relation to status, making checking more difficult
- Completion of the e-Val report does not replace the need to submit a final report
- AHRC are the exception in that they are not currently requesting final reports or imposing sanctions, pending a cross-council review
- AHRC are contacting PIs individually to make them aware of their current position
- Changes to RCUK standard terms and conditions relating to final reports will be notified after the review
Cambridge has only had a few instances of this, but Research Accounting will monitor sanctions applied to us so that we can continue to assess the extent of the issue. The email notice from the Research Office issued with the Final Expenditure Statement will be amended to emphasise the need for the final report to be submitted on time to avoid sanctions. Please raise awareness of the above with your departments.
If you have any questions, please contact your Research Support Administrator/Advisor http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/offices/research/contact/default.aspx
RCUK Equipment Funding – email award confirmation to PI
Research Councils (notably the EPSRC) are currently providing notifications of successful awards to PIs only, with a request that the PI confirm the 50% matched funding on their equipment budget within a 3 week deadline. Although it is asked that the Research Office also provide confirmation, the emails are not being copied to the Research Office. This means that there is a risk that reduced equipment budgets are accepted either without due approval via departments (plus Schools where relevant) and the Research Office, or that the 3 week deadline is not met because it is assumed that the Research Office is already aware of the notification.
To address this situation, we have made a request to the Councils that they copy in the Research Office when they send the award e-mails and will let you know how this progresses.
ERC Synergy Grants Announcement
The ERC has introduced a new pilot scheme, called Synergy Grants (SyG) in the 2012 ERC Work Programme. This call will be published on 25 October 2011 with a single deadline of 25 January 2012. The ERC Synergy Grants are aimed at outstanding researchers throughout Europe, who jointly work on an innovative research project. The group can consist of a minimum of two and a maximum of four Principal Investigators and the objective of the Synergy Grants is to foster interdisciplinary research. ERC Synergy Grants will be granted for a period of up to 6 years and comprise a maximum funding of 15 million EUR. Please note that in line with other ERC applications, the EC strongly recommends early registration and submission well in advance of the call deadline.
Further information can be found in the ERC Work Programme 2012 on pages 32-38: http://ec.europa.eu/research/fp7/pdf/wp2012/wp2012_ideas_en.pdf#view=fit&pagemode=none
Research Grants User Group (RGUG) - 20 Sept 2011
The next meeting of the RGUG will take place on Tuesday 20 September at 9:30am and will be held in Lecture Theatre 2, Computer Lab, West Cambridge. The RGUG is led by the Research Office and is a forum where research grant administration issues and developments are discussed. An agenda for the next meeting can be found on the Research Office website http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/offices/research/rgug/
Cambridge University Hospital R&D patient panel
Cambridge University Hospitals Research and Development department has a panel of 38 people from all backgrounds and all ages, who review research studies at the development stage and provide feedback to researchers free of charge. If you are interested in using this review service, please contact them at their new email address ppi@addenbrookes.nhs.uk