Published in The Australian, 25 October 2016

Leading Australian scientists and researchers are calling for the establishment of a national body to manage complaints of research misconduct, saying the current system usually fails those accused, whistle-blowers and the public.

Last week the University of Queensland became the latest university to be embroiled in alleged research misconduct, as a former researcher pleaded not guilty to fraud-related offences in Brisbane District Court.

Professor David Vaux, an eminent scientist and long-time advocate for a national body to handle complaints, said internal investigations into academic misconduct within universities were often conducted by inexperienced personnel, sought to protect reputations and were plagued by conflicts of interest.

“There’s a lot of pressure on researchers. People know if they don’t get that paper published then they might not get the next grant, which means they might not get their salary paid or their visa renewed. The incentives are lining up to encourage people to bend the rules,” said Professor Vaux, deputy director of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research.

The Australian Academy of Science and other agencies had been “asleep at the wheel” on research misconduct and should be championing research integrity in line with academies internationally, he said.

Significantly, among those calling for a national body is Dr Kerry Breen, a member of the Australian Research Integrity Committee, the entity established by the NHRMC and the Australian Research Council in 2011 following several high-profile misconduct cases.

Dr Breen, an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Forensic Medicine at Monash University, has argued that universities can struggle with the task of investigating and adjudicating allegations of misconduct.

“A more centralised, independent process of oversight and monitoring of this role played by the universities and institutions would help support those institutions and help maintain community confidence in the research endeavour,” Dr Breen wrote in the Internal Medicine Journal earlier this year.

Advocates point out the ARIC can only review investigations to determine if they followed procedures set out under the Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research, rather than evaluating the investigations themselves.

ARC reports show that in 2014–15 the ARIC finalised two reviews that it had received the previous year, while it received one request for review which was determined to be outside its scope.

Professor Simon Gandevia, deputy director and foundation scientist at NeuRA, said the current approach to research misconduct in Australia was failing.

“Institutions conducting research with external funding can no longer take several years to conduct investigations, conduct them in complete secrecy, fail to report their outcomes to the public and hide behind enterprise agreements which ensure that findings cannot be obtained by those who really paid for the research, and whose lives may ultimately be affected by its outcomes,” Professor Gandevia wrote in a letter to the journal in support of Dr Breen.

Professor Mark Israel, an Adjunct Professor of Law and Criminology at Flinders University, told the HES there was a history of problems with the investigations conducted by universities, which had led to the establishment of the code in 2007.

“However, it is still difficult to evaluate the success of those investigations on a national level because we just don’t have access to the data,” said Professor Israel, who has written extensively on academic misconduct in Australia and internationally.

“It is not reported back to the sector in a way that universities can learn from investigations in other institutions.”

He questioned the extent to which the current review of the Australian code would be informed by evidence, given the lack of publicly-available data on the investigations into misconduct.

Professor Vaux said there were several models overseas which Australia could borrow from, such as the Office for Research Integrity in the US which provides oversight of investigations.

“A reasonable model would have the universities manage the initial investigation but they would register it with the office and advise how they planned to handle it, and then provide regular updates,” he said.

The national body could provide information, assistance and advice to the institution, as well as guidance on suitable experts to act as inquiry members, he said.

“If the body thought things weren’t flowing as they should be, or it received an appeal from the person accused or the whistle-blower, then they could send someone in to be more hands on,” Professor Vaux said.

Leanne Harvey, acting chief executive of the ARC, said instances of research misconduct at Australian universities are rare, and are managed appropriately when they do occur.

“In the context of over 40,000 researchers and over 55,000 research students a 2009 joint ARC/ NHMRC survey on the implementation of the code found there had been only 60 cases of research misconduct brought before Australian institutions, with only 14 of these found to be misconduct under the code,” she told the HES.