A bridge to Westminster

Parliament’s knowledge exchange unit straddles the gap between research and policy, say Naomi Saint and Sarah Foxen.

Parliamentarians and parliamentary staff have a strong appetite for up-to-date, well-communicated research. Equally, there are a lot of routes for research to feed into the UK parliament. 

Select committees need evidence to inform their inquiries; the House of Commons and House of Lords libraries use research in their briefings on a huge range of current topics; the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology works closely with academics to provide syntheses of research on public-policy issues for parliamentary use; and individual MPs and peers use research to inform debates, questions and other parliamentary work.