The iconic Lovell telescope, housed at the Jodrell Bank Observatory in Cheshire, has always expanded our view of the universe – from tracking the Sputnik launch in 1957 to its current contributions to the study of dark matter. It is now threatened with closure after it was announced that government funding will not continue past March 2028. The projected savings are just £2.8m a year.
This is just the latest in a rolling package of cuts from the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) – which disperses government funding to particle, astro and nuclear physics, among other disciplines – aimed at saving about £160m over the next four years. The STFC has insisted that the measures are a result of cost overruns. That may be true, but it is hard not to see this as part of a larger shift in what kind of science the government funds and prioritises, and what areas it allows to wither.
There is no doubt that physics is expensive. From telescopes to synchrotron beams, its instruments are increasingly large-scale and power-hungry. And scientists are not immune to the cost of living crisis. If households are feeling the pinch of electricity costs, just imagine getting the monthly bill for a particle accelerator. However, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), of which the STFC is a subsidiary, has just gone through a revamp of its funding model, one that clearly prioritises economic growth and measureable outcomes. Looking across the programmes cut, which include international collaborations with other telescope arrays and the Cern facility in Switzerland, many scientists believe that long-term, fundamental research is under specific threat.
The UKRI and STFC have not helped the situation by badly misreading the politics. In a session at the House of Lords earlier this month, the UKRI chief, Ian Chapman, seemed surprised by the scientists’ “hyperbolic” reaction, and noted that they “feel that they have been cut” when, in fact, overall physics funding has increased. But scientists have reason to feel slighted when valued ongoing projects and collaborations – rather than future plans – are axed, and when what appear to be relatively small cost savings (the UKRI budget will be £10bn by 2030) fall on their shoulders. There are shades of the departed Starmer government in this saga: the UKRI wants to tell a big story about science funding going up, but instead is mired in a row over a fairly minor sum that has angered scientists and sections of the public. One does not have to be an astronomer to know that optics matter.
The UKRI and STFC are technically arm’s‑length bodies, but it hasn’t escaped notice that the ministers who set its funding priorities, Liz Kendall and Patrick Vallance, are no longer in office, while Andy Burnham has abolished the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology. It would seem a good time for the current course to be reconsidered, whether by the funding councils or the new government itself.
There is a conversation to be had about what research we fund with limited resources, and the balance between so-called blue sky projects and those expected to yield commercial returns. But when physicists warn that the UK could lose a “generation of scientists” to these cuts – in one of the few fields in which we can credibly claim to be world-leading – they should be heeded. It’s time to refocus, and look again.
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