Research assessment in New Zealand could be marked down

The PBRF has helped researchers in some ways, in some areas. But there are glaring issues with the system that I'm not sure can be solved without some fairly substantial overhaul. The grades are all too often misused, unfairly damaging the careers of valuable research and teaching staff. The assessment panels are blatantly biased; PBRF serves as an instrument to define their own work as some gold-standard. Furthermore, any research that explores the overlap of different disciplines is summarily trashed, which is absurd given the opportunity for actual ground-breaking, inter-disciplinary research. I could go on. The author states there is "no evidence of any fall-off in the quality of teaching" -- as someone who actually teaches in a University, I can assure you that PBRF is damaging teaching. There's no incentive to teach when all management cares about is PBRF. And regarding "the introduction of the PBRF saw an increase in the quality and quantity of research" -- this is according to PBRF metrics. Has Smyth considered that maybe it's just that the universities are better at gaming the system? NZ universities have dropped on international research rankings.