Brexit

Higher education engineering is a major internationally recognised and competitive UK asset.

Engineering relies on non-UK collaboration more than most academic disciplines in terms of both research projects and attracting experts from all over the world to research, study and teach in the UK.

Our university engineering departments have higher proportions of international researchers than the average for all subjects and the ability of the UK to attract the best researchers in a field is critical to the maintenance of the UK’s excellence in research and higher education. Engineering research addresses global issues, for which international and EU partnerships are critical to the effectiveness and impact of the work.

Engineering is just one area of the research that goes on in higher education that would be affected by Brexit, but it accounts for a fifth of the research conducted in UK universities and the engineering sector generates a quarter of the country’s GDP. The EPC’s analysis looks at the impact of withdrawing this funding stream only, but it recognises the impact will be exacerbated by other cuts to EU research funding.

Please find a wide selection of resources related to this campaign below (including our publication ‘The Impact of Brexit on HE research funding: an EPC research briefing’).