Policy Hub

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Policy Hub: to be the first port of call for promoting improvements in policy-making and delivery.

Government Social Research Unit, HM Treasury

Website

Click here to go to the Policy Hub home page.

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages good practice

Supplies links to evidence providers

Launched in March 2002

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

International Comparisons in Policy-Making: To enable practitioners to improve the quality of public policy development and delivery in the United Kingdom by easing access to reliable and relevant international policy-making experience and increasing the use of that information.

Government Social Research Unit, Cabinet Office

Evidence based 'how to' guide

Place on Policy Hub website. Click here to go to the web-based International Comparisons in Policy-Making toolkit on Policy Hub.

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages good practice

Supplies links to evidence providers

Launched in March 2002

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Foresight Programme: The UK's Government-led Foresight programme brings people, knowledge and ideas together to look ahead and prepare for the future.

Business, the science base, Government, the voluntary sector and others work together to think about what might happen in the future and what we can do about it now to increase prosperity and enhance the quality of life for all.

Foresight, Office of Science and Technology, Department of Trade and Industry (DTI)

Website

Click here to visit the Foresight website.

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages good practice

Live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

e-Government Benchmarking: To compare the UK government's progress with other countries in the development of e-government and to identify key learning points.

e-Government Unit, Cabinet Office

International e-Economy Benchmarking: The World's Most Effective Policies For The e-Economy. - London, 19 November 2002

Click here to visit the e-Government website.

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Supplies links to evidence providers

Live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

www.renewal.net: To ensure that a higher proportion of people take an evidence-based approach to the design of neighbourhood level initiatives and to ensure that increased use is made of evaluated evidence about what works.

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages good practice

live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Evidence for Policy Choice: For Departments to provide an assessment of the evidence underpinning each Public Service Agreement (PSA) objective.

Under each objective, drivers and policy levers have been enumerated and the research questions and evidence already gathered on the effectiveness of policies has been presented.

The site will also provide a monitoring mechanism for assessing progress in evidence based policy-making.

Public Service Delivery Analysis Team, HM Treasury

Website

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Supplies links to evidence providers

Website to be launched

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Children and Young People email alert & Knowledge Pool:

To provide a one-stop source for Treasury personnel working in the policy area of children, young people & families.

HM Treasury

Knowledge pool held on intranet.

Weekly e-mail alerting service available free to anybody working in this policy area, across government, think tanks, voluntary & community sector, research bodies. Please contact cyp.webmaster@hm-treasury.gov.uk to request a sample copy

Gathers evidence from government departments (public domain), quality press, think tanks, voluntary & community sector, research bodies for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence.

Encourages knowledge sharing and good practice.

Supplies links to evidence providers.

Knowledge Pool 'Live'

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

New Sites for Analysts: Library updates web pages to provide links for sites of interest to analysts. This is complemented by an e-mail alerting service.

HM Treasury

Library website

Supplies links to evidence providers

Provides access to sources of evidence

Live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Economics Training: Department for Education and Skills training to improve the use of economic evidence in policy development and analysis.

To enhance the economic literacy of the department and transform Department for Education and Skills into an economic department.

Department for Education and Skills (DfES)

A rolling programme of internal presentations, led by internal analysts, and attended by a mixture of analysts and senior policymakers.

Tailored external Training programme for non-economists on the economics of education and relevance to policy-making in the UK.

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages good practice

Provides access to sources of evidence

Live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Internally cross-cutting evaluation and appraisal steering groups: To promote the use of evidence-based policy-making, review research activity in their areas, identify gaps and overlaps, and set priorities.

Department for Education and Skills (DfES)

Steering groups for:

DfES as a whole;

Schools;
Post-16 and Youth Policy

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages best practice

Supplies links to evidence providers

Encourages knowledge sharing

Live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

External Advisory Panels: to provide a forum where internal and external representatives can review the available evidence, discuss policy options and identify gaps in knowledge.

Department for Education and Skills (DfES)

Policy-research seminars

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Supplies links to evidence providers

Live

3 panels, covering early years and schools issues, issues around the 14-19 age group, and around lifelong learning, higher education and skills.

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Reviews of Research Evidence: To provide expert capacity to summarize the evidence base as the policy need arises in priority topic areas.

Lays out the evidence base alongside the policy product.

Research and Development Division, Department of Health

Publishable hard copy or web disseminated summaries of evidence produced for particular policy development exercises, sometimes developed iteratively with policy groups.

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Ongoing

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Register of Findings of Research (ReFeR): To provide a publicly accessible database of findings from all research funded by the Department of Health, project by project.

Links research findings with public; and with professionals, and others working in health and social care services.

Research and Development Division, Department of Health

Web based register giving title of research project, researchers, institution, summary of findings, and list of publications.

Click here to visit the Register of Findings of Research (ReFeR)

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Ongoing, updated six-monthly.

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Dissemination strategy for a programme of projects on child care: to ensure the key findings from research reach target social services practitioner audiences.

Major strategy aimed at getting research into practice.

Research and Development Division, Department of Health)

Twenty four individual project publications and summaries of findings; numerous articles in professional social work press; overview publication 'The Children Act Now: Messages from Research' sent free to all Social Services Department; Conference opened by Ministers. Regional seminars.

Provides access to sources of evidence

Completed. Other programmes of Research and Development being dealt with in a similar way.

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Strategic Futures Project: to identify some of the key challenges - both threats and opportunities - which the government is likely to encounter over the next 10-20 years.

Strategy Unit, Cabinet Office

Identification and scoping of strategic cross cutting challenges, which might affect how Government functions over the next 10-20 years.

Co-ordination of a series of seminars with senior civil servants, academics and business experts to discuss strategic futures issues.

Additionally, the co-ordination of a group of strategic planners from Whitehall, the Devolved Administrations and the European Commission to promote consideration and discussion of strategic cross-cutting issues and to develop and share best practice in futures work

Ad hoc research papers on key futures issues.

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages best practice

Supplies links to evidence providers

All strands of work are in progress and work completed so far can be found on the SU website.

Click here to visit the Strategy Unit website.

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Research and Development Co-ordination Unit, National Assembly for Wales (NAW): As well as supporting the professional development of research staff, the unit is actively involved in promoting best practice and the importance of evidence-based policy-making.

Research and Co-ordination Unit, National Assembly for Wales (NAW)

Skills audit of officials involved in research, development and evaluation will be used to create a 'can do' directory to promote methodological knowledge sharing and best practice.

Developed databases to improve access to evidence from research projects undertaken by the National Assembly for Wales (NAW) or commissioned by the department.

Currently working to develop a Research, Development and Evaluation internet site through which databases, research forum best practice guide and other information useful for evidence-based policy-making will be made available.

Gathers evidence for wider dissemination

Provides access to sources of evidence

Encourages knowledge sharing

Encourages good practice

Supplies links to evidence providers

Live

Name and Aim(s) of initiative

Lead organisation

Output

Characteristics

Status

Allows quick access to the different Government Office regions, either by using the map to the right, or any of the regional images across the top of the screen.

In creating this new site, ODPM have also re-designed all existing Government Office websites to give them a similar structure and design and to make it easier for users to navigate across the regional sites and find out information on the same subject in different regions with a single click.