Whistleblowers: Staffs runs into trouble over research ethics

When The THES reported that Staffordshire University had been forced to issue tough new rules on research ethics, after evidence emerged that research had been going ahead without proper scrutiny or approval, the university was quick to issue a reassuring statement.

But the reassurances have not convinced everyone, including a research volunteer who has instructed solicitors to ensure that the university investigates his complaints about the conduct of a postgraduate research project he took part in.

Earlier this month, The THES ran an article on a report from the university's ethics committee. In December 2001 the committee had warned that procedure had not been working properly - "a serious issue should there be any media interest", the committee said. "Evidence has emerged that research projects... are being undertaken without appropriate ethical scrutiny."

But Staffordshire said that there had been no risk to people who acted as research subjects. The committee was tackling the issue of ethical sign-off at corporate level, the spokesman said: "The university has had formal procedures at school level covering research ethics for student research at all levels for a considerable period of time."

But further documents have emerged that suggest that these school-level procedures were hardly infallible.

In June 1998, the chair of the university's academic ethics committee, Ann Parry, wrote to all schools, saying that "each school should make provision for a school research ethics committee... I would stress to you that (this) is vitally important".

But almost 18 months later, by January 2000, at least three schools had failed to appreciate the "vital importance" of ethics and had not set up committees.

Nick Revell, the ethics committee's secretary, was forced to write to the deans of the schools of business, law and engineering reminding them of the 1998 instructions, and asking: "Would it now be possible for you to let me know the current position in your school?"

A further memo written in August 2000, more than two years after Dr Parry's letter, confirmed that an ethics committee for the School of Humanities had only just formed.

In December 2001, more than three years after Dr Parry first implored schools to set up ethics committees, she reported that they were still not working properly.

"The processes that the university has in place would not appear rigorous and thoroughgoing, particularly at their point of origin in schools," she said.

Dr Parry told The THES this week that she believed that Staffordshire was ahead of other universities in ensuring proper ethical approval for research.

She said: "The point about setting up committees in the schools was not that there was nothing there in the schools." Schools had had their own systems, but the moves were meant to ensure that the university had systematic and centralised data.

After The THES 's article, the university also insisted that the review of its procedures had nothing to do with the complaint from an aggrieved research volunteer.

"The university has only ever received one complaint that related to a research ethics matter," it said. "This is very recent and we will, of course, take it very seriously."

This week, Fisher Meredith, the solicitors acting on behalf of the research subject, confirmed that he had first complained to the university in October 2001, but the university declined to hear the complaint. Staffordshire said that because the complainant, a student, had directed his complaint against an individual researcher who was a postgraduate student, it did not fall inside the complaints procedures.

A spokeswoman for Fisher Meredith said that their client was concerned that the university had relied too rigidly on procedural technicalities to avoid hearing his complaint. It claims it was only when its client re-formulated his complaint, with the help of Fisher Meredith, and directed it against the university itself, in April 2002, that the university decided to investigate.

The university said it could not comment on the complaint or its investigation, as confidentiality was essential.