1. What are the criteria for Lead Organisations in respect to governance and ability to deliver?

Lead Organisations would normally be expected to meet the following criteria:

Ability to Deliver

The organisation should:

  • Be able to demonstrate in-house capacity in terms of staff and infrastructure to support and lead excellent research programmes;
  • Provide evidence of a commitment to maximising the wider impact and value of its research to the benefit of local economies and society;
  • Demonstrate commitment to the principle of open access publication (costs for open access publishing led by LMIC partners may be included in applications for funding);
  • Have sufficient capacity to deliver research and/or other outputs that are appropriate to the wider aims of the Creating Safer Space network and that can be meaningfully recorded and reported as such;
  • Demonstrate an ability and commitment to provide appropriate leadership and support to those staff involved with funded research activity.

Governance and Control

The organisation should:

  • Demonstrate good governance and control functions including policies and approaches to control risk and mitigate fraud and corruption;
  • Have satisfactory processes for preventing, detecting, reporting and responding to allegations of slavery, fraud, bribery and corruption;
  • Have satisfactory processes in place that meet Research Integrity and Ethics requirements, including processes for dealing with allegations of misconduct;
  • Be subject to appropriate levels of independent audit;
  • Demonstrate an ability to support the effective collection, management, analysis and dissemination of data.

Financial Stability

The organisation should:

  • Demonstrate that they are financially stable and have robust assurance around managing and accounting for grant funding;
  • Have a bank account that is in its legal name and that can be reconciled to the appropriate finance management system;
  • Have a basic finance management system that can be used to reconcile the bank account, to record all cash and payments ensuring that all transactions can be individually identified and provides suitable storage for supporting documentation;
  • Have satisfactory procedures in place for making payments for per diem, travel advances or review of receipts and subsequent reimbursement of expenses for approved official travel.

Sub-contract Management

Where the project involves sub-contracting to third parties, the organisation should:

  • Ensure there is a policy in place to sufficiently manage sub-contractors and address any associated financial or compliance risks.

We are required to undertake checks to ensure all organisations meet these criteria. Please contact us if you have any questions about these criteria, and please bear with us as we undertake due diligence checks.

Unless otherwise agreed with the Creating Safer Space team, the Lead Organisation must be a Higher Education Institution / University or a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO). Please contact us for further advice.

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2. What kind of UK organisations can apply for funding?

Principal and Co-Investigators based in the UK are normally expected to belong to a UK Higher Education Institution eligible for UKRI funding. Please contact your research office to ask if this applies to your organisation, or see the UKRI website for further details.

Other kinds of UK organisations would normally be expected to be Project Partners rather than Principal or Co-Investigators.

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3. Who can be a Co-Investigator on a project?

Co-Investigators are normally expected to be employed by an organisation that has the capacity to support the research. These organisations will normally be expected to meet the same requirements as Lead Organisations in regard to Ability to Deliver, Governance and Control, Financial Stability, Sub-Contract Management and Legal Registration (described above in Question 1), but not necessarily to the same extent. If the project is awarded funding, due diligence checks will be undertaken on the Co-Investigators’ organisation. Please contact us if you have any questions about these criteria.

If a Co-Investigator is not employed by an eligible organisations, there may be other ways to involve them in the project:

  • If the Lead Organisation is willing, it could employ the person as a Researcher or Co-Investigator for the duration of the project. Their involvement should be described in the Case for Support, and a Letter of Support must be provided by the Lead Organisation to confirm the arrangements.
  • If the person is a consultant or contracted researcher in their home country, it may be possible to include them in the project as a consultant or contracted researcher, rather than as a Co-Investigator. Consultants or contracted researchers provide advice and a service for a fee, but are not responsible for the development of the project or for the outcomes. Provided arrangements are made in accordance with applicable law, the use of a consultant or contracted researcher is permitted, but the Funding Panel may look closely at whether the use of a consultant or contracted researcher is good value for money, whether there are any ethical or safeguarding implications, whether there are any legal or procurement implications, and whether this is suitable for the activities and the time commitment described. The use of a consultant or contracted researcher should be clearly described in the Case for Support.

Co-Investigators can be based in almost any country in the world. There are special funding rules for Co-Investigators from high income countries (including the UK), China and India – please contact us in advance for advice.

Please do not include too many Co-Investigators on a project. A contract has to be signed by all organisations involved in the project, and having many Co-Investigators from different organisations can delay the project’s start date.

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4. Can an informal organisation (such as a grassroots movement) apply for funding?

Lead Organisations are normally expected to be legally registered within their home countries. Exceptions may be possible, so please contact creating-safer-space@aber.ac.uk at the earliest opportunity if your organisation is not legally registered. Potential issues include the ability to conclude legally binding contracts and receiving payments.

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5. Can an independent / freelance researcher apply for funding?

No, this is unfortunately not possible. Principal Investigators must be employed by an eligible Lead Organisation, as described in Question 1. Please see Question 3 for rules in regard to Co-Investigators.

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6. Can a PhD or Master’s student apply for funding?

Applications for funding to support PhD or Master’s projects will not be accepted.

Special rules may apply if the PhD or Master’s student is an employee of an eligible organisation, and would like to carry out a distinct research project as part of his or her work for that organisation. Please contact creating-safer-space@aber.ac.uk for more information.

PhD or Master’s students can be employed on a project as part-time or short-term Research Assistants, if this is allowed by their organisation.

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7. What do we need to consider if our organisation is based in a country subject to UK sanctions (e.g. Myanmar, South Sudan) or would like to work with such an organisation?

All project activities must comply with UK sanctions requirements. You must ensure that no project funds are transferred to any individuals or organisations on UK Sanctions Lists under any circumstances. For example, if you hold a workshop or a conference, you must check in advance that none of the invited speakers or participants are on any UK lists of financial sanction targets or proscribed terrorist groups. You are also required to check that you do not use your funding to purchase any items that are subject to sanctions (e.g. dual-use civilian-military equipment, such as drones).

We would very much like to work with eligible organisations in Myanmar and South Sudan, but please bear in mind that we can only support your project if our bank allows us to transfer you funding. We believe this will be possible in certain circumstances, but we cannot guarantee that it will be possible before we try.

Please contact us before preparing an application involving organisations in the following countries: North Korea, Iran, Syria, Cuba, or Crimea (Region of Ukraine). We might not be able to transfer funding to these countries.

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8. Does my nationality matter?

Individuals of any nationality are normally welcome to apply for funding. What matters is the nationality of your employer, not your own personal nationality.

For example, you cannot be the Principal Investigator on a project if you are a citizen of the Philippines, but an employee of a Canadian university. This is because a university in Canada is not eligible to be the Lead Organisation for the project.

But if you are a Canadian citizen working for a university in the Philippines, you are eligible to apply for funding.

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9. Do we need to be able to speak English to apply?

There is no requirement for Principal or Co-Investigators to speak English, but we will unfortunately not be able to provide the same level of service to speakers of other languages.

The grant is administered by Aberystwyth University in the UK, and information about grant conditions, contracts, and reporting requirements will be provided in English. We are happy for you to contact us in other languages, and we will use Google Translate to translate your messages. We cannot be held responsible for any misunderstandings that arise from mistranslations, but we will do our very best to address any misunderstandings that do occur.

Applications can be submitted in English or Spanish only.

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10. Can I apply for more than one grant?

You can apply for more than one grant, but you must have the capacity to deliver all projects that are awarded funding. Please consider your time commitments carefully.

The process of applying for a grant also involves a significant time commitment. Two rushed applications are much less likely to be successful than one fully developed application.

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