https://doi.org/10.36866/pn.92.9

Osborne announces science funding settlement

In June George Osborne presented Spending Round 2013 to Parliament, in which he announced that the ‘resource’ funding for science would be maintained at £4.6 billion for 2015-16. The chancellor also announced that capital funding, which was slashed in 2010, would receive a welcome boost and funding levels would be increased in real terms from £0.6 billion in 2012/13 to £1.1 billion in 2015/16, after which the capital budget is to grow in line with inflation until 2020-21.

The Society broadly welcomed the Government’s recognition of the value of science to the UK; however we remained concerned what impact the continuing ‘flat cash’ resource budget settlement will have on the UK science base and will continue to call on the Government to look to increase funding for UK science. There will need to be another concerted effort by the community around the time of the next general election in May 2015 to ensure that science receives the funding it requires to flourish.

Animal research statistics released

In July the Home Office released the animal research statistics; the headline figures showed an increase of 8% in the overall numbers of procedures used to 4.1 million procedures. This increase was attributed to a 22% increase in the breeding of GM animals. In the field of physiology the numbers of procedures fell by 29% to 430,909 procedures, which is roughly in line with the statistics from 2008-2010. The policy team continue to work with our collaborators both to enhance the regulatory environment and to boost public perception of animal research.

As mentioned in the last edition of Physiology News, The Society is represented on the Concordat on Openness in Animal Research, which aims to increase openness and transparency in animal research. The project is now in full swing and it is hoped that the concordat will be released for public consultation by September/October and launched by the end of the year.

STEM disability transition conference

The Society was involved in arranging a highly successful conference highlighting some of the challenges faced by disabled STEM students during the transition phases from ‘school to university’, ‘through university’ and from ‘university into work’. The conference was held at the Institute of Physics and had a full house with over 70 delegates, comprising representatives from higher education institutes, civil service, learned societies and disability organisations. The organising committee will shortly be publishing a report on the conference, which should provide recommendations on how the transition process for disabled STEM students can be improved.

Women in Science

Three highly successful women in science seminars were held at IUPS and Caroline Wood has provided an in depth review on the sessions on page 12. At these sessions The Society launched a ‘Women in Physiology’ booklet; thanks must go to Sue Wray who came up with the idea and was very much the driving force for the project. The booklet highlights the career paths of a number of female physiologists and can downloaded from www.physoc.org/diversity.

New Council members join the Policy Committee

We are delighted to announce that new Council members Lucy Donaldson and Fiona Hatch have joined the Policy Committee.

If you are interested in these or any other policy related issues please contact us via policy@physoc.org