Australia could jeopardise its European research collaboration aspirations if it fails to strengthen security around its own research, an expert has warned.

Brendan Walker-Munro said Australia¡¯s wavering efforts around research security risked a scenario where ¡°every other country stops wanting to collaborate with you because it¡¯s undermining their security as well¡±.

He said research security was ¡°something we need to deal with¡± if Australia was serious about associating with Horizon Europe, the world¡¯s largest collaborative research scheme. ¡°The European Union is going to¡­say ¡®we are doing A, B and C. What is Australia doing in that same vein?¡¯¡±

Organisations working in the EU must meet the exacting privacy standards prescribed in the General Data Protection Regulation, Walker-Munro noted. ¡°I think they¡¯ll do exactly the same with research security. They¡¯ll say¡­¡®you [have to] meet our standard or we¡¯re not going to play in the same sandpit as you.¡¯¡±

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A?Southern Cross University legal academic specialising in research security, Walker-Munro spent years working in investigations and enforcement for government industry and competition regulators. He is an invited speaker at the , starting on 28 October in Brussels.

The conference brings the EU¡¯s research and innovation community together to discuss how to safeguard the continent¡¯s research in ¡°a rapidly evolving geopolitical landscape¡±, following the European Commission¡¯s May 2024 of an EU Council .

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The decision committed the 27 member states to develop and implement a ¡°coherent set of policy actions¡± including national action plans and guidelines, resilience testing, information exchange, advisory hubs and analysis of the ¡°threat landscape¡±.

The 8,000-word recommendation also specifies roles for research funding organisations and the EU itself ¨C including the establishment of a European Centre of Expertise on Research Security ¨C and outlines support?available to universities and research institutions.

European countries are also acting unilaterally. , the and the have dedicated national knowledge security desks to advise academics about research security, while German universities have .

Canada, which joined Horizon Europe last year, launched its in 2021. Its 2024 policy bars Canadian institutions from receiving funding for research in ¡°sensitive¡± areas if they have partnerships with research institutions or laboratories connected to potentially hostile military, defence or security entities.

Walker-Munro said Australia¡¯s efforts to tackle research security issues, by contrast, had faltered. The University Foreign Interference Taskforce (Ufit) guidelines, published in 2019 and updated in 2021, were now outdated, while the government had acted on only about one-quarter of the recommendations from a 17-month inquiry into national security risks affecting universities and research institutions.

The 2022 report from the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security offered 27 recommendations to deal with harassment, censorship and intelligence gathering by foreign governments on Australian campuses. They were backed unanimously by politicians from both major parties, while the government supported 21 of the recommendations outright or ¡°in principle¡±.

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ÌÇÐÄVlog asked the lead agency, the Department of ÌÇÐÄVlog Affairs, how many of the recommendations had been enacted. It had not provided a response by publication deadline.

Five of the recommendations, all endorsed in principle by the government, concerned recruitment programmes such as China¡¯s?Thousand Talents Plan (TTP). In response to one of these recommendations, the government promised to require institutions seeking membership of the to declare their ¡°exposure¡± to talent recruitment programmes.?This does not appear to have?happened, and the Defence Department did not respond to a request for confirmation.

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The government also undertook to boost ¡°due diligence¡± around talent recruitment programmes by articulating universities¡¯ reporting responsibilities regarding their implementation of the revised Ufit guidelines. Asked whether this had happened, the Education Department ¨C which employs Ufit¡¯s chairman ¨C referred the enquiry to ÌÇÐÄVlog Affairs.

The European agreement specifically addresses talent programmes sponsored by foreign governments. It requires member states to help institutions assess the risks, focusing particularly on ¡°undesirable obligations imposed on their beneficiaries¡±.

Walker-Munro said Australia lacked any government policy on membership of talent recruitment schemes ¨C unlike the US, where Harvard University chemist Charles Lieber was convicted for concealing TTP payments.

¡°Australia¡¯s universities are being asked to shoulder the burden of research security without a clear framework or consistent support,¡± Walker-Munro said.

He said that if Canberra pressed ahead with joining Horizon Europe, the EU would ultimately define the ¡°parameters¡± of Australia¡¯s participation. This could see it barred from projects of certain scale or involving certain fields.

¡°It¡¯s a bit like¡­sitting at the kids¡¯ table at the wedding, which is not [where] a First World country wants to be sitting.¡±

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john.ross@timeshighereducation.com