Memorandum submitted by Todd Huffman (FC
38)
1. The problems of STFC are numerous. Some
of these problems are impossible to avoid when severe budget cuts
are imposed.
2. However, most of the difficulties STFC
experiences can be either directly or indirectly traced to the
manner in which the executive is chosen. The executive of STFC
is hand picked by government. Consequently the role of the executive
is never to "speak truth to power" but to make an attempt
to impose government policy upon the research sector. Often these
policies conflict with the research mission of the organization
or if not in conflict, seem to have been formulated in a vacuum
with no thought or advice taken on how such policies might be
formulated to improve their effectiveness in these areas of research.
3. Ministers may not like to be told that
their policies are inappropriate, and they may not listen anyway,
but they still need to have executive members of the research
councils who will tell them the truth as they see it and who will
not see the civil servants in Whitehall as "bosses".
This can only be achieved if the executive of the research council
is clearly selected from below and further can be formally removed
from below as well. An elected executive would re-instate the
Holdane principle that has been essentially destroyed over the
last decades ... a principle that has resulted in the UK punching
far above its weight in science and innovation.
4. STFC was initially created with insufficient
funding. The exact source of this is in dispute but significant
cost over-runs of the Diamond facility certainly could not have
helped this situation. Had the executive of PPARC been selected
from the community a much stronger voice would have been available
to halt this misguided move. Even if the move was deemed "inevitable"
an elected chief executive would have been able to more forcefully
put the case forward to obtain sufficient funds from the treasury
to start up the new council.
5. Promises of sufficient funding were broken
by the government. It is likely this was even possible because
it was thought there was no danger of protest or outcry when the
chief executive of STFC is firmly in the grip of Ministerial masters.
The effort so many are expending right now trying to recover from
this initial mistake, and then almost immediately following on
with even more severe cuts would be much reduced.
6. It would be a bad idea of amazing proportions
to further attempt even more consolidation of STFC within some
even larger research council. The first such attempt, with the
creation of STFC as a larger research council containing elements
that do not even have a primary research mission, has not gone
well. What worked much better was a more tightly focused research
council with a clearer research mission. A Fundamental Science
Research Council (FSRC) ought to be created instead containing
Particle Physics, Astronomy and Astrophysics, and Space Science
should be created with the National labs incorporated within the
"areas of excellence" Scheme that is hoovering up research
money for dubious benefits.
7. A Fundamental Science Research Council
(FSRC) ought to be created instead containing Particle Physics,
Astronomy and Astrophysics, and Space Science should be created
with the National labs incorporated within the "areas of
excellence" Scheme that is hoovering up research money for
dubious benefits.
8. The key is to obtain some level of clarity
and consistency in the funding of research: Crisis after crisis
is not helpful to research at all, let alone morale. Perhaps unknown
to the people in this committee is the fact that first PPARC and
now STFC have always jumped from one crisis of funding to another
over the last decade. In an era which showed the greatest scientific
investment in the UK for a very long time; the kind of fundamental
science that actually attracts the most young people has gone
from one cliff-hanger to another.
9. A research "ring fence" is
therefore very welcome but the desired effect of constancy has
not been apparent in PPARC and STFC—it has felt more like
a series of short periods of hope dashed by new crises. Besides
the ongoing problem of the cost of the international subscriptions,
this boom/bust may have been partly due to the strategy followed
by the leaders of PPARC who felt they needed to emphasise a catchy
new project in each CSR in order to maximise the funding it received
from the government. When the new project was approved it wasn't
at a sufficient level, so strong cuts were required in other projects
on a time scale much shorter than their natural project lifetime,
while the new project needed to try to build up at an unrealistic
rate. Both the "boom" and the "bust" were
inefficient. (STFC has been so much worse it just doesn't bear
talking about.) A ring fence of the total is therefore not sufficient—we
also need an understanding on the part of the government and its
agencies that repeated short-term shifts of research priorities
are unproductive. That certainly doesn't mean new priorities should
never be introduced but that they need to come with an appropriately
long-term vision.
SUGGESTIONS TO
HANDLE RESEARCH
BUDGET CUTS
10. Ministers must understand that, by every
independent measure thus far, UK science in Particle Physics and
Astronomy is world class. There is NO FAT left in the system.
We do not do any science that isn't right at the front-line of
research. All cuts are going to bite into excellent programmes
doing world-class research and many great ideas are already not
being pursued because of the depressing climate surrounding research
funding. The reduction in potential for future world-changing
innovations like the world-wide-web is already a danger.
11. There is no need for ministers to consider
the issue of "how to make cuts". The research community
has demonstrated this year that we can rank projects on the basis
of our own and external peer review and painfully remove projects
of lower ranking to meet a given budget. Our goal will ever remain
to keep the best research we can without destroying our infrastructure
so that, if one day fundamental science is again funded, we are
ready to take up the lead once again.
DECLARATION OF
INTERESTS
12. I am an academic employed at a UK university
and involved in particle physics (STFC funding).
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