Trustees' Report and Financial Statements 2015-2016
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TRUSTEES’ REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS 1 Trustees’ report and financial statements For the year ended 31 March 2016 2 TRUSTEES’ REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS Trustees Executive Director The Trustees of the Society are the Dr Julie Maxton members of its Council, who are elected Statutory Auditor by and from the Fellowship. Council is Deloitte LLP chaired by the President of the Society. Abbots House During 2015/16, the members of Council Abbey Street were as follows: Reading President RG1 3BD Sir Paul Nurse* Bankers Sir Venki Ramakrishnan** The Royal Bank of Scotland Treasurer 1 Princes Street Professor Anthony Cheetham London EC2R 8BP Physical Secretary Professor Alexander Halliday Investment Managers Rathbone Brothers PLC Foreign Secretary 1 Curzon Street Sir Martyn Poliakoff CBE London Biological Secretary W1J 5FB Sir John Skehel Internal Auditors Members of Council PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP Sir John Beddington CMG* Cornwall Court Professor Andrea Brand 19 Cornwall Street Sir Keith Burnett** Birmingham Professor Michael Cates B3 2DT Dame Athene Donald DBE* Professor George Efstathiou** Professor Brian Foster** Professor Carlos Frenk* Registered Charity Number 207043 Professor Uta Frith DBE Registered address Professor Joanna Haigh 6 – 9 Carlton House Terrace Dame Wendy Hall DBE London SW1Y 5AG Dr Hermann Hauser Dame Frances Kirwan DBE* royalsociety.org Professor Ottoline Leyser CBE* Professor Angela McLean Dame Georgina Mace CBE Professor Roger Owen* Dame Nancy Rothwell DBE Professor Stephen Sparks CBE Professor Ian Stewart Dame Janet Thornton DBE Professor Cheryll Tickle** Dr Richard Treisman** Professor Simon White** * Until 30 November 2015 ** From 30 November 2015 Cover image Tadpoles overhead by Bert Willaert, Belgium. TRUSTEES’ REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS 3 Contents President’s foreword ................................................ 4 Executive Director’s report ............................................ 6 Trustees’ report ................................................... 8 Promoting science and its benefits .................................... 11 Recognising excellence in science ................................... 27 Supporting outstanding science ..................................... 41 Providing scientific advice for policy ................................... 51 Fostering international and global cooperation ........................... 57 Education and public engagement ................................... 67 Fundraising and development: support for the Royal Society ....................81 Financial review .................................................. 87 Governance ..................................................... 90 Independent auditor’s report to the Trustees of the Royal Society ................ 97 Consolidated statement of financial activities .............................. 99 Comparative consolidated statement of financial activities ..................... 101 Consolidated balance sheet ..........................................102 Consolidated statement of cash flows ...................................103 Accounting policies ...............................................104 Notes to the financial statements ...................................... 111 4 TRUSTEES’ REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS President’s foreword Having taken over as President of the Royal Translating ideas into innovation has been Society (the Society) in November 2015, I feel a key theme for the Society this year. With that I can offer something of an outsider’s the Government conducting its five-yearly perspective on the Royal Society’s work over Spending Review, the Royal Society worked the past year. It is our Fellowship that makes with the Academy of Medical Sciences, the the Society’s contribution to our culture unique. British Academy, and the Royal Academy of Our Fellows are the ones who are leading the Engineering to make the case for ongoing science that allows us to better understand investment in research. The case was a and change the world around us. They are also compelling one and the Government’s well placed to identify the people and ideas commitment to increased spending in this that will improve the lives of people in the UK area through until 2020, when many parts and beyond. of public spending face significant cuts, is a recognition of the crucial role of research to Tomas Lindahl FRS was awarded this year’s a successful innovation-based economy. Venki Ramakrishnan Nobel Prize in Chemistry and Arthur B McDonald President of the FRS was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics. Beyond the Spending Review, the Society Royal Society The Society’s own Copley Medal, which dates funded 43 Industry Fellowships to support back to 1731, was awarded to Peter Higgs FRS. knowledge transfer between academics and These awards are just some of those given to industry. We also launched the Transforming Fellows over the past year reflecting their huge our Future conferences to address some of contribution to society. the major scientific and technical challenges of the next decade. We initiated a major The contribution of science and the Society project on machine learning to explore the covers a wide spectrum, from understanding roles machines may play in the future in the world around us, and indeed inside us, transport, healthcare provision, the financial to the application of that knowledge to services sector and a range of other areas of improving lives and driving the economy. our everyday lives. There was support too for This year the Society supported 425 of a range of ideas through our innovation awards the most promising early career scientists such as the Brian Mercer Awards for Innovation through our University Research Fellowships, and Feasibility. Sir Henry Dale Fellowships and Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowships. This long-term support, often at a pivotal point in their careers, gives these exceptional young people the best possible opportunity to fulfil their potential. TRUSTEES’ REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS 5 As a person who has lived and worked on Whether it is tackling the problem of antibiotic four different continents, I appreciate how resistance, helping industry and others international the scientific endeavour is and attempt to curb pollution, increasing our the Royal Society remains a truly international understanding of and ability to treat cancers, player. Over the past year the Society has understanding the workings of the human fought to protect European Union (EU) brain or the universe, Royal Society Fellows science funding as an investment in our future and Royal Society funded researchers are and sought to inform the debate on the EU at the very forefront of improving our world. referendum. We have also collaborated with the national science academies of the USA The result of the referendum on UK and China to examine the emerging issues membership of the EU, which resulted around genome editing – a topic we expect to in a majority in favour of leaving, critically rise in global significance in the coming years. affects the science community. I have been and will continue to emphasise that in the The Society is one of several Newton Fund challenging times ahead we must maintain delivery partners tasked with supporting the international focus of UK research and research collaborations that will establish a not short-change our investment in science. well-trained research community which will promote the economic development and welfare of developing countries. In the past year we have made 110 Newton Fund grants and awards. The Newton Fund was established in 2014 with £75 million a year shared among a number of delivery partners, and we look forward to continuing to be an active partner through until 2021 when the Fund will have increased to £150 million a year. 6 TRUSTEES’ REPORT AND FINANCIAL STATEMENTS Executive Director’s report Convening meetings and instigating In the summer of 2015, the Society convened collaborative projects are among the Royal many of the UK’s leading scientific institutions Society’s greatest strengths and this year there with the BBC to plan a major new long-term have been many examples of such projects project to engage the public with science. New which have the potential to improve society. Age of Wonder was launched by Lord Hall, Director General of the BBC, as part of the In 2011, a Royal Society report, Brain Waves, BBC’s case for charter renewal. The Society will explored developments in neuroscience and be working with the BBC and others to deliver their implications for society and public policy this major initiative. and identified a gap between the current understanding of neuroscience and the day-to- Our ability to mobilise people throughout the day working of the justice system. To address science community is central to our success. this, the Society has put together a programme The best people to inspire an interest in of seminars and meetings with senior judges science are those who are actually doing the Dr Julie Maxton to foster a deeper understanding of science science and our goal is to give people the Executive Director by lawyers and vice versa. We held events opportunity to meet our scientists. of the Royal Society on memory, uncertainty and probability and will hold a further one on mental capacity. In In education we help put practising scientists addition, with the Royal Society of Edinburgh, in the classroom and this year’s Partnership we have initiated a project to provide judges Grants projects saw schools look at projects with