Physics-funding - epetition reply
8 April 2008
We received a petition asking:
"We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to reverse the decision to cut vital UK contributions to Particle Physics and Astronomy."
Details of Petition:
"Due to cost overruns the UK's funding agency for particle physics and astronomy, STFC, is recouping £80M with deep cuts to UK physics operations in these areas. These include ending the UK's involvement in the International Linear Collider - the next generation of particle physics experiment. This risks relegating the UK to second tier involvement in future research and critically damaging the country's standing within the community. Furthermore UK Astronomy will be seriously hit with up to a 25% cut in grants. This is incompatible with the government's stated aim of making Britain a world leader in science. A review of this decision has recently been announced and we urge the Prime Minister to press for another solution to this problem before UK physics is set back by decades."
Read the Government's response
In October 2007, the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) received an overall budget of £1.9 billion for the CSR period, an additional £185 million over the CSR period compared to the 2007/08 baseline. This represents an overall increase in funding of 13.6%. There has been no cut in the STFC's budget, and the funding provided was consistent with the guidance given to all Research Councils.
Claimed reductions in STFC's budget appear to have been derived from STFC's aspirations for the three-year Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) period (2008/9 - 2010/11). These aspirations never constituted an agreed set of activities or funding for them, and the suggestion that £80m has been cut from its budget is wrong.
Like all Research Councils, the STFC's Science Board, and its advisory peer review committees, has undertaken a programmatic review and prioritisation exercise, the results of which have been made available for public consultation. On 7 February 2008, the STFC Council announced that the underlying funding for physics exploitation grants would remain broadly level in the next financial year (2008-09). This follows large increases in funding in recent years and means that there would be no major reductions in physics funding before the outcome of the Wakeham Review is known. (Professor Bill Wakeham, Vice Chancellor of Southampton University, has been asked to lead an independent review of the health of physics overall and we, and the Research Councils UK (RCUK), will pay close attention to his conclusions, which are expected in the Autumn.)
It is worth noting that even in the plans published by STFC in December 2008, the funding of each of the main disciplines will still be substantially above 2005 levels. Investments in key areas raised by the petition have grown considerably since 2005/06, taking into account the widely supported move towards paying the full economic costs (FEC) of research in universities. Since that time there has been:
- A 43% increase in funding for Particle Physics grants (2005/06 c.f. 2008/09)
- A 78% increase in Nuclear Physics grants (2005/06 c.f. 2008/09)
- A 67% increase in overall funding for Astronomy grants (2005/06 c.f. 2008/09)
This will ensure that the number of Astronomy post-doctoral research assistants funded in 2008, remains roughly level.
Some existing programme areas, including the International Linear Collider (ILC), will not be funded by STFC. The US Congress seems to share this sceptical view of the prospects for the ILC, and has cut US investment in it by 75% this year. The STFC's decision ensures that the UK's substantial investment in the Large Hadron Collider at CERN is exploited before embarking on a further facility of such scale. These decisions have been taken on the basis of peer-review evidence.
The UK research community will continue to be able to carry out international research, through access to a range of world-class facilities, including CERN, as well as the European Southern Observatory, ESRF and ILL, and programmes of the European Space Agency. Major new facilities in the UK such as Diamond and the ISIS Second Target Station will also provide opportunities for world-leading scientific research.
There have been concerns about UK access to the Gemini telescopes. Contrary to statements made by the Gemini Board, STFC has never issued formal notice to withdraw from the project and continues to negotiate the terms under which UK researchers have access to Gemini telescopes in future, whilst seeking to reduce its financial contribution. In the meantime STFC intends to pay the UK's 2008 contribution to maintain UK access to the Gemini telescopes for the 2008A semester (February - 31st July 2008). In any event, the UK will still retain access to other 8-10m class telescopes in the northern hemisphere, in particular the Japanese Subaru telescope in Hawaii and the GranTeCan telescope on La Palma. The UK remains a full member of the European Southern Observatory and through that continues to have access to top class telescopes in the Southern hemisphere.
There has recently been press discussion about the future of Jodrell Bank, which is owned and run by Manchester University. STFC is supporting a project called e-Merlin, which is a UK network of radio telescopes being developed by researchers at Jodrell Bank. You may have heard that e_Merlin received a relatively low ranking in STFC's Programmatic Review. One of the factors in the ranking of e-Merlin is that the project is running behind schedule by at least two years. While the project is expected to be completed within the capital budget provided by the University of Manchester and NWDA, this is costing STFC £2.5m for every year of delay. STFC has consulted about this and a number of other projects. It will take no decision about e-Merlin until this consultation process is complete, but it has however made it clear that the e-Merlin project is part of its strategy for radio astronomy, and that it wants the UK to play a leading role in the next large radio astronomy project, the Square Kilometre Array, which for reasons of radio interference could not be built in a densely populated area such as the UK. Jodrell Bank hosts the European Headquarters for the project, and therefore has a major role to play in it.
The Government continues to attach considerable importance to STFC's activities and to physics and scientific research more generally. Research Council expenditure on physics is already in excess of £500m, and is expected to increase over the CSR period.
It is a tribute to UK science that it will always be the case that there will be more proposals for scientific research than the funding is able to cover. Funding bodies such as STFC will always have to make difficult decisions and it is both justified and understandable for there to be a debate over how these decisions are made.
We will continue to work with the STFC and the wider research community to ensure their concerns are addressed in a constructive manner.
If you would like further information on the progress of STFC's programmatic review, the next steps, and STFC's community consultation, please consult the STFC's website.
Further Information
Young People's website