UK Research council funding for next year was cut by the DTI in order to make up budget shortfalls to the tune of £68 million. A likely result is fewer PhD and Masters scholarships and less money for research and equipment grants in the next academic year.

There is a petition on the Downing Street web site if anybody wants to voice an objection.

petitions.pm.gov.uk/reseach

thanks for the info PostgradForum Team.

Funding cuts like this really hoot me off....there is no reason why funding for academia and research should be cut - it is all very well trying to plug a shortfall, but when you see where the literal billions of £ of tax payers money is alternatively diverted (i.e. Olympics, Dome *ahem* etc) it makes my blood boil.

It's funny that someone can't spell research

Somebody should have done their research.

well spotted H

when you type the link with the correct spelling, you get:

We couldn't find any petition with a reference like "research".

Maybe that's all part of the bigger, clandestine operation to prevent people from signing the petition?

lol @ Otto you might be right... It is government we are talking about, anything is possible.

There's also a Group on Facebook (which will at least allow us to debate it further).