DE MONTFORT University has reported a record year during 2025 in providing expert advice to governments at a local, regional, national and international level.
The work nationally with government has been spearheaded and co-ordinated by DMU’s Policy Unit, which delivers policy guidance and evidence to government officials, civil servants, and practitioners to help shape research questions, methodologies, and outputs to ensure real-world relevance.
The unit brings together diverse expertise from government departments, international organisations, academic networks, and civil society to tackle complex policy challenges that no single institution could address alone.
A Visiting Policy Fellows programme hosts civil servants and policy experts within the unit, while placing DMU researchers in government departments for hands-on policy experience.
This has included the work of DMU’s Policy Unit offering expert advice to the UK Science and Technology Network; Department of Science, Innovation and Technology; UK Government Office for Science; and Ministry of Defence.
In Leicester, the university’s newly-established CAPs (Community, Academics and Public Sector) Research Project is providing expert advice to policymakers in the city and regionally.
Academics are working with Leicester City Council officials and the community to address previously identified issues and come up with policies to address those issues.
Work is ongoing to shape new policies on equitable health care, improving access to the city’s arts and heritage and on making the city more inclusive to refugees and asylum seekers.
The work is initially aimed at the City of Leicester but will be shared wider with policymakers across the UK.
A fourth project is providing advice to the UK Government on how to use the ecological value of trees to finance reductions to the National Debt through a wealth creation scheme.
Professor Mike Kagioglou, DMU Deputy Vice-Chancellor Planning, Research and Innovation, said he was proud of the university’s work during 2025 on providing expert advice local, nationally and internationally.
He said: “This university prides itself on the quality of its research and the experts in their field who are able to offer advice to those at the very top of government in this country and internationally.
“However, we also recognise the importance of work in our home city of Leicester and the responsibility we have regionally through our expertise.
“The advent of the CAPs policy project is an important development and takes the work we are doing to a level above what we have done before. It has truly been a record year.”
Further examples of the work have included:
Nationally, The SMIDGE project (Social Media narratives: Addressing Extremism in Middle Age) addresses the rise of extremist narratives, misinformation and conspiracy theories online. The provides evidence to the UK and five other European governments and focuses on the middle-aged demographic (ages 45-65), who play influential roles in shaping political discourse and societal attitudes. In addition to producing counter-narratives, SMIDGE is providing policy recommendations, training resources and educational tools for journalists, educators and security professionals.
A DMU academic has been named as one of the founding members of a new Government taskforce set up to get more women into technology and provide advice to ministers on how to achieve that aim. Dr Ismini Vasileiou, Associate Professor in Cyber Security at DMU and Director of the East Midlands Cyber Security Cluster, has been appointed to the Women in Tech Taskforce by Technology Secretary Liz Kendall MP.
Expert advice from DMU has been commended by the Minister for Science, Research and Innovation demonstrating how artificial intelligence can be used to detect improvised underground explosives has been commended. Lord Patrick Vallance praised the university’s contribution to safer demining operations in post-conflict zones.
Expert advice from DMU researcher has produced a policy guidance document for the Scottish government on dealing with the harms caused to children who are forced to live in temporary accommodation. The project, carried out jointly with University College London (UCL) set out to understand children’s own experiences of living in the temporary accommodation system in Scotland, and the impact this has on wellbeing, education, and opportunities later in life.
Regionally, wide-ranging research to identify the health needs for people in Leicestershire is being carried out by DMU experts as part of joint Government and NHS funded project. DMU, Loughborough University, The University of Leicester, and University of Nottingham, as well as Leicestershire Academic Health Partners will provide policy guidance and evidence to officials.
Locally, an DMU expert is providing evidence and policy guidance on how to eliminate food poverty in Leicester. Professor Jonathan Davies has been appointed as independent chair of Feeding Leicester, part of the Feeding Britain Network, set up a decade ago by former Labour minister Frank Field in response to the work of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Hunger and Food Poverty.
Internationally, The United Nations has chosen to lead a international network aiming to build better cities and communities across the world. The university has been chair of the global academic hub for SDG 11. This means it will lead a team of other co-chair universities across the globe in providing evidence and policy guidance on issues like affordable housing, transport and disaster resilience in cities worldwide.
A DMU law professor is part of an international research team awarded more than €10.4 million to transform how police and investigators around the world conduct interviews. The six-year project, titled JUSTICE will advise governments and police forces throughout Europe.
A £3.5 million plan to generate clean energy and tackle e-waste issues in Sub-Saharan Africa will provide evidence for policy to governments across the continent. Led by Professor Muyiwa Oyinlola of DMU, the £3.5 million project is part of the Circular Economy Powered Renewable Energy Centre.