Watt Report

I just had a quick review of the Watt review on Australian university research funding – http://www.education.gov.au/boosting-commercial-returns-research

My opinion is that the whole thing is based on a false premise…

1. Observation: low levels of engagement between universities and Australian business with respect to research outcomes

2. The assumed cause, which is incorrect, is that universities aren’t incentivised through the research grant system and hence don’t properly engage with business

3. The proposed actions that will make no difference: fiddle with the grant schemes yet again

The reason that universities aren’t engaged much with Australian business is that 70% of our GDP is in the services sector and most of the companies in the services sector are users of off-the-shelf technology platforms serving the local market and not developers of technology platforms for export sales.

I see no upside in the fiddling with the grant schemes for universities if business (note I say business and not industry, which is a misnomer) has no interest.

Having said that, I would note that university education is our third largest export (sad that).

Since the business sector lacks interest in research outcomes I would focus the grant process on helping universities get up the university rankings in order to help the value of those educational exports. This is the only way that fiddling with university grants could help our exports.

So sad to say, I think the report is extremely misguided.