Freedom of information (FOI) releases from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)
This is a disclosure log of UK Research and Innovation's responses to freedom of information (FOI) or environmental information regulations (EIR) requests that might be of wider public interest.
If you can't find the information you're looking for, you can make a new FOI request.
1,058 disclosures
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Request Received: 16 June 2020
I wish to make the following request under the FOI provisions:
1. A copy of the Equality Impact Assessments (EIAs) for the "Repeatedly Unsuccessful Applicants Policy" prior to its introduction in 2008/09 and at any date immediately prior to the policy subsequently being changed, amended or updated
2. Copies of any statistical analysis relating to consideration of the reliability and/or robustness of the criteria with regards,
a. The types of applications excepted from the policy
b. The selection of a 24-month qualifying window
c. The criteria of lower half of prioritisation list
d. The use of three unsuccessful proposals within the lower half of the prioritisation list
e. The use of the decision date rather than submission date for applications, including but limited to the variability of EPSRC processing and decision times for applications
3. Any document providing consideration of comparability of the policy to other policies across other research councils within UKRI
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 21 January 2020
Can you please tell me the amount of money that the MRC committed to tinnitus research in 2016/17, 2017/18 and 2018/19?
Published: 7 July 2021
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Response Received: 28 April 2021
Please could you provide the following information with regards to assessment policies and standards for the recent loan competitions, specifically the Innovation Continuity Loans: Strand 1, 2, and 3 November 2020.
1.Strand 1 - Continuation of a live project
2.Strand 2 - Follow on from a recently completed Innovate UK project
3.Strand 3 - Continuation, completion or follow on of a project not supported by Innovate UK
Part 1 - Guidance and Marking Scheme
Can you please provide:
- What guidance assessors were provided with to assess applicants and/or IUK's expectations how feedback should be provided to applicants.
- The scoring criteria assessors (marking scheme or its equivalent) used to gauge how assessor's scored questions.
Part 2 - Assessment Policies and Standards
Specifically, would you please confirm the current policy on how Innovate UK prepares assessors, and the process, for new competitions, and how assessor standards are assessed continuously to ensure accurate and quality assessments for applicants? My particular concern is not about opinions that assessors form that are different from one another, but situations where factual and numerical information, in particular, is missed by one or more assessors, where the other assessors have clearly read the same information, thus hindering the applicant's scores. Observing numerical information, when stated, is imperative as these items are typically required by the guidance Innovate UK publishes on competitions for applicants to provide/adhere to.
To support the public interest in understanding Assessment Policies and Standards, could you please provide additional information from the below:
- What was the average number of applications an individual assessor was likely to receive from the Innovation Continuity Loans Strands 1, 2, and 3 competitions?
- How many assessors were used for Strand 1, Strand 2, and Strand 3?
- What was the average time Innovate UK allocated/allowed per application assessment in the context of the Innovate Continuity Loans for Part A?
- What was the average time assessors took to complete the individual applicant assessment process? Does this vary greatly compared to the minimum and maximum?
- In what way do Innovate UK track the performance of their allocated assessors to ensure quality assessing is carried out? Is this held to any standard in retrospect, i.e., where assessors peer-review an unknown peer to ensure all criteria are captured, or additionally, can you please provide a policy on standards of assessing? For example, are there feedback mechanisms to improve IUK processes from assessor points of view and mechanisms for IUK to provide feedback to assessors on standards/quality of assessment compared to the marking scheme, guidance, or where information has clearly been missed by the assessor?
- Is training provided, or other reference material provided, in how to assess applications?
- What was the average period (in working days) between when assessors received applications to assess, and when were assessments required to be completed? Were there particular calendar dates for assessors to adhere to?
- If competitions are oversubscribed how does Innovate UK manage the additional load, whilst ensuring assessors are not overburdened? Is there a maximum number of applicants any one assessor is allocated by Innovate UK?
- Is there any feedback from assessors where concerns have been raised about not having enough time to assess applicants? What proportion of the assessors is this, and what proportion of applicants is this compared to the total submitted (which are being assessed)?
- Finally, what are the monitoring procedures taken to ensure compliance and accurate assessments within these standards/policies?
In all information requested it would be much appreciated if you could, alongside your answers, direct me to the specific area of text where such policy is mentioned in any handbook or policy document (complete with issue date, and any possible plans for change/past changes to the document or policy within the next/last 12 months).
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 20 March 2020
For the SMART October 2019 competition, for both the 18 month streams:
1. The number of applications
2. The number of successful applications
3. The success rate
4. the minimum successful score
5. the maximum successful score
6. maximum score of failed applications
7. average grant fund value per project
8. total funds allocated
9. the score distributions of the applications (e.g. % (or number) of applications which scored <70, 71-75, 76- 80, 81-85, 86+)
10. the count of successful projects by innovation area for each strand.
I would also like to request the number of unsuccessful applications, if any, which scored above the minimum funded score, please.
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 24 February 2020
My request pertains to the research grant number EP/D050839/1 that was awarded to Brunel University by the EPSRC from 2006 to 2009.
I would like to request an electronic copy of the detailed final report submitted by Brunel University to the EPSRC describing the work carried out and the way the resources were utilised in this grant please.
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 12 March 2020
I cannot find the mandatory gender pay gap data and a written statement on your website - could you help me please?
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 20 January 2020
A list of the grants given under Innovate UK funding programmes, where the activities funded are related to the LaunchUK Commercial Spaceflight Programme.
For each item in the list, could you please include
1. Name and address of the grantee
2. Name of funding programme
3. Nature of activities funded
4. Funding amount in £
5. Date of grant awarded
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 9 March 2020
Please can you send me the following contract information via email with regards to the organisation's telephone system maintenance contract (VOIP or PBX, other) for hardware and Software maintenance and support:
a. Contract Type: Maintenance, Managed, Shared (If shared please state the organisation it is shared with)
b. Existing Supplier: If there is more than one supplier please split each contract up individually.
c. Annual Average Spend: The annual average spend for this contract and please provide the average spend over the past 3 years for each provider
d. Hardware Brand: The primary hardware brand of the organisation's telephone system.
e. The number of telephone users:
f. Contract Duration: please include any extension periods.
g. Contract Expiry Date: Please provide me with the day/month/year.
h. Contract Review Date: Please provide me with the day/month/year.
i. Application(s) running on PBX/VOIP systems: Applications that run on the actual PBX or VOIP system. E.g. Contact Centre, Communication Manager.
j. Contract Description: Please provide me with a brief description of the overall service provided under this contract.
k. Go to Market: How where these services procured, please provide me with either the tender notice or the framework reference number. Please specify if procured through other routes.
l. Contact Detail: Of the person from with the organisation responsible for each contract full Contact details including full name, job title, direct contact number and direct email address.
If the service support area has more than one provider for telephone maintenance then can you please split each contract up individually for each provider?
If the contract is a managed service or is a contract that provides more than just telephone maintenance please can you send me all of the information specified above including the person from with the organisation responsible?
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 2 April 2020
In relation to the information provided regarding the Managed Print Service (MPS) contract held by UKRI (refer- ence 2019/0313).
From the list below, please can you confirm which research councils are included in this contract & which buy separate, if any?
- Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council
- Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council
- Natural Environment Research Council
- Economic & Social Research Council
- Arts & Humanities Research Council
- Medical Research Council
- Science & Technology Facilities Council.
In addition, please confirm if the additional organisations are included in the MPS contract or purchase separately:
- Institute of Food Research (as it receives funding from the Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council)
- The National Oceanography Centre (parent is Natural Environment Research Council)
- Rothamsted Research (as it receives funding from the Biotechnology & Biological Sciences Research Council).
Published: 7 July 2021
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Request Received: 13 April 2020
I want to submit a request for some information from the organisation, in relation to their contract's register.
The contract register should display all the organisations existing/live contracts I would like the register to display the following columns/headings:
1. Contract Reference
2. Contract Title
3. Procurement Category
4. Supplier Name
5. Spend (Total or Annual)
6. Contract Duration
7. Contract Extensions
8. Contract Starting Date
9. Expiration Date
10. Contract Description [Please provide me with as much detail as possible.]
11. Contact Owner (Full contact details if possible.)
12. CPV codes/ProClass
IMPORTANT
1. For those organisation planning to make an exemption around spend, the spend information I have requested is an overall figure and I am not requesting a complete breakdown of services relating to the spend.
2. If the organisation has a CRM system or a similar system there should be a facility to download and extract contract data.
3. You may forward me a Weblink to a portal to download the contract register, please make sure all of the organisation's contracts are provided as doing prior research I have found that most organisations have only uploaded a small portion of all of their contracts.
Please do not think that this is the only information I require if you could provide me with more information that would be great.
Contract Data/API Contact Details
13. Can you also provide me with contact details of the person responsible for the actual contract's register or someone responsible for API? [Name, Job Title, Telephone, Email Address] At the very least provide me with their actual job title.
(Meaning of API "a set of functions and procedures that allow the creation of applications which access the features or data of an operating system, application, or other service.")
Please provide me with the contract's register file in an excel format.
Published: 7 July 2021