- 18. The first thing to note is that the number of applications is only one half of the equation - the other is the cost per application which all three proposals will have the effect of increasing. A department which knows it is bidding for funding over a five year period is bound to put more work into its research proposals than an individual bidding for a small grant; it would be bizarre if limiting universities to a fixed quota of applications did not increase the amount of work put into making each application (to say nothing of the effort expended in making proposals which the university chooses ultimately not to submit). Finally, the knowledge that there is no opportunity to resubmit a failed proposal will surely encourage applicants to put more effort into getting it right first time.
- 19. In practice the cost of the process is determined to a very great extent by how much is at stake for the applicant not by the extent of the formal data requirement. Simply trying to ration or discourage applications means that each application is more critical. This means that any fall in the number of applications will be offset by an increase in the cost per application. No-one is currently in a position to say whether the net effect will be higher or lower overall costs; but it would be reassuring if the Research Councils were to demonstrate an awareness of the fact that reducing the number of applications is not necessarily the same as bearing down on costs or cutting bureaucracy.
- 20. The fourth proposal is an effort to reduce the costs per application. It is doubtful, however, that requiring outline proposals from all applicants to be followed by full proposals from those short-listed will achieve this. As noted above, it is the amount at stake rather than the size of the formal information requirement which chiefly determines how much effort applicants put into applications. The likelihood is that short-listed applicants who are required to submit an initial outline followed by a full proposal will do more work than before; and it is far from certain that applicants will put less work into outlines than they currently do into full proposals (and if they do, they may well use the extra time to write more outlines). It is quite possible, therefore, that the net effect will be to increase costs rather than to reduce them.
- 21. This discussion serves to demonstrate that it is far from straightforward to reduce the costs of peer review - and it is, in any case quite inconceivable that the current proposals will reduce it to anything like the cost of the RAE (estimated at up to £14m per year).

## The effect of the RCUK proposals on distinctiveness

- 22. In paragraph 6 (above) it was noted that it is impossible to justify the higher costs of the Research Councils unless they perform a distinctive role. All of its proposals undermine the unique role that the Research Councils currently play, and RCUK is therefore taking a big gamble that it can reduce costs to the point where distinctiveness ceases to be important. In any evaluation of the dual support institutions, the first question for RCUK to answer must be this: does the cost differential between the Research Councils and Funding Councils represent value for money?