AusBiotech calls for action on R&D Start

Peak biotechnology industry organisation AusBiotech will urge the Federal government to announce the future of the R&D Start scheme on July 1.

Executive director Dr Tony Coulepis said the government should be in a position to announce a specific resumption date for the successful program once the new Commonwealth budget comes into effect.

"The Start grant system has been almost the single initiative that has really visibly stimulated the industry," Coulepis said.

"Why does the government have to wait until the end of the year to make an announcement on the program's future?

"Why can't we work together with the government earlier to work out what went wrong and what we can all do to fix it?"

Last month, AusIndustry announced it would indefinitely freeze the program following a $40 million blow-out in spending this financial year.

The government organisation attributed the problem to companies ramping up their R&D cash burn and eating into their allocated resources more quickly than had occurred in previous years.

Despite AusIndustry labelling the freeze as indefinite, Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane said he was committed to seeing the popular funding program resume in the next financial year.

Coulepis said there was no reason for the government to wait until later in the year to chart the program's future.

He said it should know what was or was not possible once the Federal Budget, handed down a few weeks ago, comes into effect on July 1.

"What they are trying to do is reshuffle funds and see how they can allocate more funding to the Start program," he said.

"Our sources tell us the government wants to try not to have a repeat of the large call on funds at a time when the funds are being depleted, but we still think that doesn't stop an announcement from being made quicker."

Coulepis said AusBiotech wanted to give government "the benefit of the doubt" that the funding halt was simply a budgetary glitch.

He said biotechs could still be satiated if the government said in July it wanted to reserve any further comment for the time being, but would invite industry to discuss ways to avoid a recurrence of the blow-out.

The issue will be discussed at an AusBiotech directors' meeting on Wednesday May 29 at which Kerri Hartland from government body Biotechnology Australia has been invited to speak.

"It is a golden opportunity to talk about this and discuss ways AusBiotech can assist the government get the program going again," Coulepis said.