Regulators' Pioneer Fund: interim evaluation report and case studies

The Regulators’ Pioneer Fund (RPF) is a Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) programme which sponsors regulators and local authority projects which contribute to creating a regulatory environment that fosters business innovation and investment. DSIT commissioned the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen) to undertake an independent evaluation of Round 3 of the RPF (RPF3) to:

• understand the process of delivering the fund and projects
• assess the impact of the fund
• evaluate the lessons learned from the projects for government and wider stakeholders

The findings of the interim report are outlined below and focus on the short-term (8-month) projects that were rolled out first.  

Key findings

• Regulatory authorities’ saw the RPF as a unique funding opportunity as it provided both dedicated resources and low-risk funding conditions to support innovation
• The Fund’s entry, set-up and delivery processes benefited from the learning from previous funding rounds. This led to improvements, such as the application timeframe being extended and the Fund supporting both short- (8 month) and long-term projects (12-18 month)
• Projects still experienced some entry, set-up and delivery challenges. These included challenges in being able to deliver in 8-months because of a short lead-in time to organise staffing, contractors and stakeholders before the start of funding
• Delivery enablers were the regular catch-ups between Fund staff and projects leads, which helped to identify and resolve emerging issues, as well as key project practices. These practices included the pre-engagement work that project leads had done with stakeholders before projects started and, in particular, their management of contractors to deliver on time and to scope
• The project outcomes reflected the types of outcomes anticipated by the programme Theory of Change, particularly around stimulating a culture of innovation focus within regulatory authorities and promoting closer working relationship between regulatory authorities to progress innovations.

Methodology

A Contribution Analysis (CA) approach was used to understand whether and how the RPF programme contributed to observed outcomes relative to other potential factors. CA provides a framework for making causal inferences and understanding what the mechanisms for change are.

Qualitative methods were used to address the process, outcome and impact evaluation questions. This involved a total of 38 data collection encounters with largely staff leading on the short-term projects and RPF staff.

Interviews were also conducted with staff from regulatory bodies that were not taking part in the RPF3 to understand their reasons for not applying and barriers to Fund entry.