To be effective, the HRA must ensure that the people that need us can find us, understand and trust us, and get the information that they need when they need it.
The people that may need us include those that use our assurances, such as people deciding whether to take part in a research study, sites that are setting up research and those with questions when things go wrong . It also includes those that use our services to earn these assurances, such as researchers who need to find out what to do and earn the approvals that they need for their study to go ahead. And it includes decision-makers who want to know that the system is working well or where improvements can be made. They may use our data and insights to inform their decisions or support their engagement with others, for example showing the attractiveness of the UK to do health and social care research.
We know that not everybody has trust and confidence in research and feels able to participate. We also know that most people would feel more confident to take part in research once they know about Research Ethics Committees, so we have a role to play in making more people confident to take part in research. We also know that there is unnecessary duplication in the set up of research studies in the UK, with checks repeated when the study has the necessary approvals and assurances to go ahead – increasing awareness and trust in these approvals and assurances can help address this.
Our focus over the next three years will be to build and strengthen the profile that we need to achieve our objectives well. Getting this right will make it easier for researchers to find out what they need to do and earn approvals. It will reduce duplication because our approvals and assurances will be recognised and trusted. It will also support efforts to increase people’s confidence to take part in research because they will be able to find out about the checks and balances in place to act on the issues that matter to them in research.
This will include building on work that we are already doing to better understand who needs us, what they need from us and why they need it. We are using these insights to talk about what we do and why it matters in a way that is accessible and meaningful to those that need us.
We also need to earn and maintain trust in us and the decisions that we make. We are working to ensure that we, our committees and the people and perspectives that inform our work, are as diverse as possible, so that people can be confident that the issues that matter to them have been considered.
Over the next three years we will
Ensure that people can understand, value and trust us and the way that we work
We will:
- better understand who needs us, what they need from us and why they need it to inform how we work so that sentiment analysis will show an increase in awareness and trust in the HRA across all stakeholders that need us
- meaningfully involve people in the HRA’s work with at least 80% telling us that they feel that they had shaped and informed the work they had been involved in
- make sure that an increasing diversity of perspectives inform our work. We will set objectives for where we want to increase representation in our work and work to achieve this
Ensure that our assurances are understood, valued and trusted, not unnecessarily repeated to set up research with a 20% reduction in the percentage of people who tell us that there is duplication in study set up.
Ensure that people know when and how to raise questions and concerns with us and we are clear how we will act on them, with 100% of complaints completed in 25 days and no more than 5% resulting in a subsequent appeal to the Chief Executive.
Provide information and resources to support wider work to demonstrate the attractiveness of the UK.
This supports the government's ambitions to
- create a faster, more efficient, more accessible and more innovative clinical research delivery system - making the UK a world leader in clinical trials
- reduce the time it takes to get a clinical trial set up in the UK to 150 days by March 2026
- bring the benefits of clinical trials to everyone
- support public confidence in the Health Data Research Service
- increase in people registered with Be Part of Research supporting the government’s ambition for millions to take part in clinical trials under the 10 Year Health Plan