Dear all,
Over the last two months, STFC has released information concerning its budget and the cost savings it needs to make across the Spending Review (SR) period, internally to its staff and externally to communities, including in Particle Physics, Astronomy and Nuclear Physics (PPAN).
This has been covered extensively in the sector press, and we have received correspondence from a diverse range of people represented by the disciplines and facilities in which STFC invests.
UKRI CEO, Ian Chapman, and I have also met with and continue to meet people from across the affected communities to listen to their concerns and ideas. On 9 April I met with stakeholders at our high energy particle physics and astro-particle physics townhall in Edinburgh, and on 14 April I headed to Brighton to engage in the nuclear physics townhall. At the end of the month, we will be hosting our STFC Partnership Summit in Liverpool, which we expect will be attended by hundreds of stakeholders from across STFC’s disciplines and facilities.
Ian and I have also given evidence to the Science, Innovation and Technology Select Committee in Parliament in the last couple of months and we continue to correspond with them and answer their questions.
Across all of this engagement it has been clear to me the uncertainty that these recent communications have caused and the concerns you have raised in response to them, including on the prioritisation work currently underway.
I wanted to address some of these with this open letter.
Addressing your concerns
Early career researchers (ECRs)
Ian Chapman and I met with representatives of the ECR community on 3 March to hear their concerns and answer their questions. I recognise that fixed-term and early career researchers bear disproportionate risk during periods of change, and that the loss of a cohort of talented researchers cannot easily be reversed.
We have an ongoing PPAN prioritisation process, which has been communicated to principal investigators. This engages STFC Science Board (PPAN) to advise STFC Council and Executive Board with a set of scenarios to be considered in advance of further consultation, which will include UKRI, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), international partners and the broader PPAN community.
As part of this process, we commit to maintaining postdoctoral researchers across PPAN at least at the same level as last year (financial year 2025 to 2026) and hope to be able to increase this over time. This will enable us to fund more postdoctoral researchers than have already been awarded for 2026, and there will be additional postdoctoral opportunities related to both quantum computing and artificial intelligence. The additional funding that restores astronomy grants and consolidated grants to their 2025 to 2026 financial year levels will also be subject to regular peer review, taking guidance from the relevant grants panel as to how to achieve the most efficient process for the rounds concerned.
For particle physics theory postdoctoral researchers in particular, I’m aware that we did not issue grants in time for the 2026 particle physics theory recruitment round, and I apologise for this being the case. We are now taking rapid action to address this situation. While grants with the previously agreed 30% reduction are already being distributed to principal investigators at universities, we will make top-up funding available through additional funding streams to appoint postdoctoral researchers according to the ranked list already generated by the Particle Physics Theory Grants Panel for this round. These positions will be able to start on 1 October, noting it can take several months to appoint.
Curiosity-driven research
Curiosity-driven research is protected overall across the SR period, with bucket one totalling roughly £14.5 billion pounds and representing around 50% of UKRI’s overall investment, including a proportional contribution from underpinning foundational activity.
It is also the case that the financial situation at STFC is unique among UKRI councils because its cost base has increased significantly due to the type of research it funds and the facilities and services it manages.
International partitions
Many of you have also asked about the historical Drayson ‘partitions’ designed to insulate researchers from cost pressures associated with facilities, infrastructure and international subscriptions. They were not formal ring-fences of money nor did they provide access to additional funds when cost pressures arose. The partitions were introduced in 2009 and financially and geopolitically we are now operating in a different global environment. UKRI has also changed the way it allocates funding and the partitions no longer apply. Unfortunately we have no recourse on currency fluctuations and the way in which they increase our cost base. This is the same for other areas of research and innovation affected by, for example, oil and energy price increases.
Ongoing prioritisation process
I understand the anxiety caused by asking projects to model significant reductions and I wanted to provide some more detail on the timeline for doing so. STFC’s Science Board PPAN is reviewing engagement responses in March and April, drawing on inputs from advisory panels covering specific discipline areas. In parallel, a separate prioritisation exercise is being undertaken for the broader STFC facilities and labs.
Science Board PPAN will present scenarios to STFC Council and Executive Board in June, including impact assessments. This will enable STFC to engage with UKRI and DSIT on options from June onwards. International expert review will also form part of the process.
The prioritisation principles being applied throughout this process are scientific excellence, demonstrable UK leadership, value for money, and balancing impacts and long-term health on communities.
Where PPAN sits within UKRI
Our community engagement has also surfaced the issue of where within UKRI PPAN grants may sit in the longer term. The only rational option within the existing UKRI structure apart from STFC would be the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). At the time of UKRI’s creation there was opposition to such a move but as we move through the consultation process, it is right that we consider all options. There would be both trade-offs and opportunities for either STFC or EPSRC being accountable for PPAN and we will consider these in the coming months.
As I have said from the outset, we are committed to listening to the community as we navigate the financial pressures ahead.
Within STFC we have been managing these pressures for some time already and our staff are used to trying to make the best use of tight funding envelopes. The purpose of our prioritisation exercise is to move beyond this to a place where STFC, its disciplines and facilities become more sustainable in the longer term. STFC will absorb most of the cost pressure against its own activities, reshaping its portfolio and delivering efficiency savings in order to live within budget.
Going forwards
Thank you all for your patience and engagement throughout this process. I hope that over the coming months we can continue to work together to build a positive and future-proofed vision for STFC and its disciplines and facilities.