A clearer picture of UK research funding

"Universities in Britain get more funding from the EU than any other European country - another example of why being IN Europe is better for ..."

So argued the Lib Dems on Facebook this week, ahead of the upcoming European Parliament elections. But the graph they attached to justify their claim was less eloquent:

Though it suggests the UK gets to the most EU university funding than any other member state, readers have no reason to trust the claim. We don't know what the units are (or why there's an odd jump between 400 and 600) or where the figures are from.

We asked the Lib Dems to clarify, and they're using figures on the number of research grants provided by the European Research Council between 2009 and 2013, for projects hosted at universities and other institutions.

The Lib Dems' figures are just Starting Grants, which are awarded to "up and coming" researchers for specific projects, worth up to €2 million, although figures for other types of grant also show the UK out in front. They also only show the number of grants awarded by country rather than the total value of those grants.

But the grants aren't just given to EU member states, and a closer look at the figures showed Switzerland - not an EU member and excluded from the Lib Dem chart - in fifth place with 147 grants since 2009.

We've reproduced the chart, along with another for funding, using figures provided to us by the ERC: