Wales Centre for Public Policy

Wales is grappling with complex and long-standing policy challenges including how to meet the needs of an ageing population, reduce poverty, and increase productivity whilst transitioning to a Net-Zero Carbon economy and dealing with the fall-out from Brexit and the Covid-19 pandemic. The Wales Centre for Public Policy (WCPP) enables policy makers and public services to access and apply high-quality independent research evidence and expertise that helps to improve national and local responses to these and other challenges. The WCPP has already achieved significant success. We have had a demonstrable impact on a range of policy decisions and our unique, demand-led approach has attracted growing national and international recognition. Our proposal responds to an invitation from the ESRC and Welsh Government to set out plans to sustain and build on this success over the next five years. We will continue to conduct three distinct but inter-related programmes of work. Our work for the Welsh Government will ensure that ministerial advice, decisions, and policy direction are based on rigorous evidence. We will link policy officials to academic experts and identify opportunities for enhancing policy formulation through research. We will support the development of research capability in the Welsh Government. And, through our Research Apprenticeship scheme, PhD Internships, and the support, mentoring, and career development provided to our team, we will help build a new cadre of researchers who have the skills needed to generate and mobilise policy-relevant research. We will provide Public Services Boards (PSBs), local government and other public services with rigorous independent evidence about what works in improving long-term cultural, economic, environmental, and social well-being. We will work with our funders, PSBs, and public services to conduct a systematic evidence-needs analysis, and to co-design a programme of activities that helps to support the delivery of PSBs' well-being plans, build local capability and capacity to use evidence, and promote evaluative approaches to assessing implementation and impact. Our research on evidence use will draw on and contribute to leading-edge academic literature and inform and improve the way we in which work. It will advance understanding of evidence use through analysis of ours and others' experience of mobilising evidence, and it will systematically evaluate the impact and value-added of our work for ministers and public services. The WCPP's multi-disciplinary team provides a unique blend of experience of working in academia, national and local government, voluntary sector, think tanks and consultancy. This enables us to act as an effective bridge between the academic and policy making communities. It also means we are able to work with colleagues from a wide range of different disciplines. Our established project management processes will ensure effective management of external experts, and our work will be tailored to the distinctive policy agenda in Wales (including the well-being goals and ways of working) and recognise the importance of the Welsh language. By collaborating with external experts to draw on their existing research, we will provide rapid responses to urgent evidence needs identified by ministers and public services. Alongside this, we will focus on a small number of core topics that are priorities for the ESRC, Welsh Government and PSBs and which we are well placed to provide valuable evidence on. This focused approach will enable us to build up a body of sustained work and develop specialist knowledge and networks. We will work closely with national and local policy makers to co-design projects that support them to understand what will work in their specific political and policy contexts. And through our collaborations with What Works Centres and other strategic networks we will ensure that Wales continues to benefit from the work of other evidence providers.