Science set to suffer in post-election budgets

With the excitement of the election and the wait to see who’s would take power over, the real nitty-gritty work is set to begin – and as far as the new coalition government is concerned this means sorting out the UK’s record deficit problem.

The government plan to save over £6 billion by cutting waste and low value programmes – including science-related programmes.  The Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS) has announced a £836 million package outlining efficiency savings in its spending – which equates to around 3.9% of the department’s total budget – and the Department of Education is to see its budget cut by £670m (just over 1%). Energy and climate change will also see its budget cut by around 3%.

These cuts have the potential to be highly detrimental to science.  BIS announced that there is a £200m saving to be made in the Higher Education budget, which includes funding for university science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) departments. In real terms this means the university modernisation fund is being slashed by £118m and that the 20,000 places promised by Labour for STEM students has been cut to just 10,000. The remaining £82m will come from across-the-board cuts in areas where the sector is already struggling to make cuts.

Imran Khan, director of Campaign for Science and Engineering (CaSE) said: “Science, engineering, and universities generate jobs and promote growth, and are under-funded. We’re therefore surprised and disappointed that the higher education budget – which included funding for university science and engineering departments – has been cut by £200m.”

BIS also announced the refocusing of the £200m Train to Gain budget on apprenticeships and college buildings – £150m to create 50,000 new apprenticeships for small and medium enterprises and a £50m capital investment in further education colleges. However, further education and apprenticeships will receive a £500m boost, using some of the money saved elsewhere in the government-wide cuts.

Also set to suffer is the UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation (UKCMRI) project. Funding for the centre – which will tackle some of the biggest medical problems facing the 21st century – will now not be bought forward to this year. Instead BIS announced that the £233m will now be allocated on a year-by-year basis over the next five to six years.

£80m will also be saved through scrapping quangos such as the British Education Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA), and the BIS plans to save a further £74m by cutting the budget of Regional Development Agencies.

The flow of bright minds into UK science may be slowed if the new government puts a cap on the number of economic migrants into the country. Britain prides itself on its ability to lure the brightest brains to our science and engineering universities, and this growth could all but stop if this measure is put into place.

However, it’s not all bad news; spending on schools and education for 16 to 19 years-olds is protected – at least for the next year – and as Parliament was sworn in, the Queen mentioned in her speech the possibility of a school reform via two bills; the Academies Bill and the Education and Children’s Bill. These bills may pave the way for compulsory triple science GCSEs which both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats promised in their election manifestoes.