Marine protests sinks budget cut

A national marine biological station believes a political campaign against budget cuts has led to a climbdown by English and Scottish higher education funding councils.

Earlier this year, the University Marine Biological Station Millport on the Isle of Cumbrae warned it could face closure because of reductions in non-formula funding. This type of funding has generally been transferred to individual institutions' core funding, but the station is unique in teaching biology students fromacross the country.

The Higher Education Funding Council for England has now revised its contribution for 1996/97 from Pounds 162,000 to Pounds 197,000, while the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council's contribution will rise from Pounds 41,000 to Pounds 78,000. The councils will reduce these sums over the next four years, but less quickly than originally planned.

HEFCE has said the figures differ from those proposed in June because subsequent details from the station, including details of how it uses staff costs to apportion overheads, have provided a more accurate basis for calculations.

But the station has been lobbying a number of local politicians, and Geoffrey Moore, professor of marine biology at the station, said he believed the move was the result of political pressure.

"We're pleased that our arguments have resulted in both funding councils revising the figures upwards," he said. "But there is a proportionally greater increase from SHEFC, and we feel a case could be made for a greater increase from HEFCE."

Professor Moore stressed that even the revised sums were a substantial cut from the existing budget of Pounds 6,000 from HEFCE and Pounds 100,000 from SHEFC.