Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps he takes to assess the effectiveness of UK research bodies and university departments in working to and achieving gender diversity.

Government recognises the importance of having a research system that values and recognises all and is committed to addressing under-representation and inequalities including those around gender, disability and ethnicity. UKRI publishes comprehensive annual data on success rates for grant applications, fellowships and PhD starts for these characteristics and has taken positive steps to increase diversity in the peer review processes and advisory groups that decide on these.