The UK’s Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) will keep its three major multidisciplinary research facilities – including the Diamond Light Source synchrotron in Oxfordshire – operational, but smaller national labs face substantial cuts as the organisation seeks to save £160 million over the next four years. STFC management acknowledges that delivering the plan will be challenging, while members of the science community have expressed concern about what the cuts will mean for the country’s research sector.
The UK government’s 2025 spending review resulted in STFC’s core budget barely rising from £835 million in the last financial year to £842 million in the year ending in April 2030. Yet its expenses are due to increase significantly due to rising labour costs, foreign exchange pressures affecting international subscription payments – including contributions to the European Organization for Nuclear Research (Cern) – and past growth of the organisation’s activities and workforce. UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) will help STFC’s plan to balance its books with ‘transitional support’ of £135 million over the next three years, taken from underspends or deferred activity across its portfolio. To generate more revenue, STFC plans to ‘transform its approach’ to industrial partnerships and commercialising its assets.
STFC’s plan will protect Diamond, the ISIS Neutron and Muon Source and the Central Laser Facility, but the overall budget for these multidisciplinary facilities will reduce by 15% over four years, requiring savings of £28 million per year. STFC hasn’t said exactly how each facility will be affected, but possibilities include reducing user support and technical assistance; reducing running time at ISIS; and closing the Lasers for Science Facility and the muon beamlines at ISIS if alternative funding or operating arrangements can’t be found.
STFC will maintain its international subscriptions, even though costs are expected to increase by 19% over four years, but its National Laboratories portfolio will have to cut costs by 58%. Spending on accelerator and technology support will fall by £8 million per year by 2029, which includes mothballing the CLARA electron beam facility. Reducing access to compute capability will save £10 million per year, and instrument and technology development at least £5.5 million. The aim is that RAL Space (the UK’s space laboratory) and Hartree (which helps organisations adopt supercomputing, data science, cloud, quantum and AI technologies) will become cost-neutral by increasing commercial activity and alternative funding streams.
Progress will be assessed in 2027 and 2028. If key targets are missed, STFC warns that it will have to take further action, including possibly closing a multidisciplinary facility. But if its financial position stabilises, STFC will consider future projects beyond 2028.
Significant consequences
Speaking to the House of Lords science committee this week, UKRI chair Ian Chapman insisted that the plan, devised after broad consultation with the community, reflects ‘responsible management’ of cost pressures. Increased headcount – a rise of 800 people over four years – was a key factor in budget pressures and will have to reduce over the coming years, he noted. But UKRI’s support means STFC will have a ‘runway’ to generate more revenue to get themselves on ‘a more sustainable footing’. This will be a challenge but not impossible on a four-year timescale, he added.
Changes to funding for STFC research infrastructure will have significant consequences, says Tanya Sheridan, head of policy and evidence at the Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC). ‘These national facilities support world-leading research in chemistry, materials science and many other disciplines, and provide experimental capabilities that cannot be replicated through smaller-scale infrastructure,’ she says. ‘They also support many of the sectors that government has identified as critical to the UK’s future prosperity and competitiveness. Demand for access is already extremely high, and reduction in capacity will affect researchers, businesses, skills development and innovation.’
Cuts at the big multidisciplinary facilities will also have an impact on industrial research, and there are concerns that companies may go abroad to access synchrotron beams if user time at Diamond is cut back, for example. This could mean that eventually the UK becomes a less attractive proposition for investment into science. Speaking to the Financial Times, Johnson Matthey’s chief technology officer described ‘cuts that risk undermining these vital national facilities’ as ‘a genuine concern’ for the company.
Steve Elliott, chief executive of the Chemical Industries Association, says that he hopes any lost capacity at STFC facilities can be restored quickly or an alternative found. ‘When a nation reduces it’s science capability, it reduces economic, social and environmental progress,’ he notes.
While the Campaign for Science and Engineering (CaSE) welcomed the decision to protect STFC’s grant-giving capability and international subscriptions, it warns that ‘substantial cuts’ to research infrastructure will probably have a profound negative impact across the sector. Daniel Rathbone, CaSE’s deputy executive director, says that facilities are not a resource ‘that can be turned on and off on a whim’ and instead require ‘consistent and sustained investment’ to stay at the competitive cutting edge. Rathbone points out that these facilities are vital for the discovery research that underpins many of the government’s priorities, such as AI and quantum technologies. ‘If we lose capability in any given area, it’s likely it will be very difficult to regain in a meaningful way,’ says Rathbone. ‘[The government] should think again: is it worth losing national capability to make short-term savings?’
