Authors: Kathleen Stosch (FORTH2O) and Dan Barlow (SPICe)
How does academic research actually reach the people making decisions at Holyrood? It’s a question that sits at the heart of what FORTH2O is trying to do, and one we’ve been exploring directly with some of those who enable this.
The FORTH2O team, together with leads from our Commissioning Fund projects, recently met with the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) to talk through how our research and evidence can better feed into the work of the Scottish Parliament. It was a genuinely useful conversation, and one we think is worth sharing more widely, because SPICe is a route into Parliament that many researchers don’t know exists, or aren’t sure how to use.
SPICe’s role
The Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) is the Parliament’s internal research centre. They provide impartial, factual, accurate and timely information and analysis.
Collectively the SPICe team:
- are information and subject specialists on a range of policy issues
- carry out research on behalf of the Parliament’s committees, Members and their staff, and Parliament staff
- offer a confidential enquiry service to Members and their staff
- create electronic resources and graphics as well as reports and briefings
- help to commission and manage research from external providers
- maintain and publish parliamentary data and information
- provide library, collections management and documentation services to the Parliament.
SPICe works with MSPs to support all areas of parliamentary business and we work closely with committee clerks to support committees. They bring policy knowledge and technical expertise.
They provide impartial information and analysis on many subjects. Publicly-available outputs of this work include:
- SPICe Research Briefings – for detailed analysis on subjects including Bills making their way through the Scottish Parliament, the budget and other current policy issues
- SPICe Spotlight blogs – for concise analysis on current topics
- Committee meeting papers in Committee pages
- SPICe Fact Sheets – factual and statistical information on parliamentary business.
Academic engagement
Members of the Scottish Parliament, their staff and parliament staff need access to relevant and timely evidence and an awareness of key policy issues. They draw on many sources, including academic expertise. SPICe co-ordinate a programme of work to strengthen engagement with the academic community, enabling them to tap into the wealth of research expertise available and building capacity amongst the research community to engage with the Scottish Parliament. They can support MSPs and committees to access robust qualitative and quantitative academic evidence and expertise to support their work. This may include:
- identifying academic witnesses with relevant subject expertise as witnesses
- arranging informal briefings for Members
- identifying committee advisers
- sharing and promoting committee calls for views with the academic community
- identifying potential research questions or areas of further inquiry
- commissioning research to support committee scrutiny.
Opportunities for researchers to engage with the Scottish Parliament are summarised on the SPICe academic engagement webpages and include
- The Scottish Parliament Academia Network (SPAN) – a network of knowledge exchange professionals and academics across Scottish (and increasingly wider) higher education institutions. They use this to identify relevant expertise and share engagement opportunities.
- Academic Fellowship Scheme – enabling academics to work with the Parliament on specific projects, including contributing to SPICe briefings, blogs and seminars.
- Areas of Research Interest (ARIs) – a mechanism currently being piloted to highlight priority topics where further research evidence or insight is sought.
Keeping in touch with SPICe
Follow on SPICe X, formerly known as Twitter, @SPICe_Research
Email them at: spice@parliament.scot
Keep abreast of academic engagement opportunities by signing up to the Scottish Parliament Academia Network (SPAN)
