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

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what information the Government holds on the number of charities based in (a) the UK and (b) Wales that are in receipt of EU research and innovation funding.

Organisations in the UK can receive research and innovation funding primarily through two different EU programmes: Horizon 2020 and the European Regional Development Fund.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy does not currently hold any data on the charitable status of UK Horizon 2020 participants. However, data is available from the European Commission (EC) on participations by non-profit organisations outside of the public sector which includes participations by charities.

Based on EC data, as extracted on 30th September 2016, to date there have been 687 participations in Horizon 2020 by non-profit organisations (excluding public organisations) in the UK, including 4 from Wales.

These figures exclude public universities as they are classified as public organisations. Please note that organisations may participate more than once.

Support for Research and Innovation from the European Regional Development Fund is most often provided through intermediaries such as universities and knowledge transfer centres and it is not possible to say how many organisations have received funding until projects have been completed and the outputs verified. As most projects last for about three years, it is too early to give a figure from the 2014-2020 programmes.