back to article Brit Science Minister to probe Brexit bias against UK-based scientists

Jo Johnson, the Minister of State for Universities and Science, has announced that that he has set up an email account to receive evidence that UK scientists have been discriminated against after Brexit. A confidential survey of the UK’s Russell Group universities found cases where British researchers were being asked to give …

  1. JimmyPage Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Boo fucking hoo

    So Britain makes itself even *more* of an international laughing stock by whinging that British scientists are being treated differently to EU scientists ?

    Is that the gist of this ?

    But if only someone, somewhere had warned of the consequences of leaving the EU.

    What's that ? They did ?

    1. imanidiot Silver badge

      Re: Boo fucking hoo

      If I am to believe a researcher friend of mine they ARE being treated differently all of a sudden because of this whole brexit mess. Funding is everything within the scientific world and for instance my friends supervisor (the guy who received and manages the research grand and paying for him working there) is threatening to move the entire project out of the UK "because they might lose funding".

      The whole thing is ridiculous, but when it comes to scientific projects where 2 years is only a fraction of time and funding for 40 or 50 people working on it is coming from a large EU fund some people get nervous when a new project is getting set up and funding might suddenly dry up if something like brexit happens. Whether the fears are justified is an entirely different matter.

      1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
        Facepalm

        Re: aimanidiot Re: Boo fucking hoo

        "....EU fund....." Did your friend ever stop to think that post-Brexit and the removal of the UK's contribution the EU fund might be a chunk smaller, threatening any EU-based projects anyway? And that's before you have to look at the reduction in funding highly likely when the Italian banks collapse.

    2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

      Re: Boo fucking hoo

      Totally irrelevant, as any argument against discrimination has validity only until article 50 is invoked.

      After article 50 is invoked, it is no longer discrimination, it is financial prudence and any complaints can, should and shall go into the rounded filing folder.

      1. imanidiot Silver badge

        Re: Boo fucking hoo

        That's the whole point. Article 50 has not been invoked and no-one know when that will happen or even IF it will happen (There is still a slim chance it won't happen after all). Yet some scientists are already throwing their toys out the pram.

        1. Paul Shirley

          Re: Boo fucking hoo

          @imanidiot: If brexit doesn't happen - for real not some half assed smoke&mirrors that fools only politicians - your country will have bigger problems to worry about than science funding or EU staff feeling intimidated. And I mean from your own voters. What the EU chooses to do if you try delaying will look insignificant in comparison.

          @Lars: an actually informed population will require undoing 30+ years of press bias and outright lies (mostly thanks to BJ finding it more fun than actual reporting). Never going to happen and we'd need to reform our demockeracy, both in parliament and by hanging enough press barons, first.

          1. MAF

            Re: Boo fucking hoo

            It's Ok The ONLY good thing that came out of the referendum is that now a lot more voters are clued up to the fact that politicians can and do lie to you to get your vote. So now people will not be disappointed if Article 60 is not triggered as it'll just be another political lie....

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Boo fucking hoo

          Well, article 50 has not been invoked yet the value of the pound has fallen. That's because markets are trying to asses and take account of the risk that it will be invoked: this increases the chance of bad financial things happening in the UK and therefore makes the things denominated in pounds cheaper.

          This is exactly the same thing: since there is a significant chance of problems with the UK participation in various projects the rational thing to do is to have less UK participation to reduce the chance of such problems. This isn't discrimination, it's rational behaviour.

      2. Lars Silver badge
        Happy

        Re: Boo fucking hoo

        "After article 50 is invoked". If Britain's speed at adopting the metric system is anything to go by then I suppose the EU has to wait for quite some time before the article 50 will be invoked. I doubt they are all that happy about being held for ransom that long. Decisions are made now.

        And I agree with Richard Branson that you need a second referendum based on facts not lies, now.

        1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge
          Facepalm

          Re: Boo fucking hoo

          And I agree with Richard Branson that you need a second referendum based on facts not lies, now.

          How very EU-cratic. "You voted wrong, go away and do it again until you get it right."

          And people wonder why we voted to leave.

          1. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

            Re: Boo fucking hoo

            "And people wonder why we voted to leave"

            Absolutely nobody wonders why Leave voters voted to leave. Quite the opposite, the entire world knows why.

            It's just that most of us don't respect you for it. That isn't going to change. Ever. So just get used to it, eh?

        2. F0rdPrefect

          Re: Boo fucking hoo - Held to Ransom?

          UK net contribution to EU is still going on, every day, so where's the ransom?

  2. Dan 55 Silver badge
    Flame

    Why do I do these things? It's only bad for my blood pressure.

    Let's have a look at how he's qualified for Minister of State for Universities and Science. Some chap who's been to university and has a science background would probably be the basic requirements.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Johnson#Education

    Eton, Oxford, studied Modern History, Bullingdon Club, friends with... George Osborne. And Boris' brother, of course.

    So much for meritocracy.

    1. JimmyPage Silver badge
      Flame

      Re: Let's have a look at how he's qualified

      No, let's not. I don't know enough swear words.

    2. Mark 85
      Devil

      Re: Why do I do these things? It's only bad for my blood pressure.

      Well.. it is meritocracy... his friends have merit and their friends have merit. Just ask them, they'll tell all their merits.

    3. TVU Silver badge

      Re: Why do I do these things? It's only bad for my blood pressure.

      "Let's have a look at how he's qualified for Minister of State for Universities and Science. Some chap who's been to university and has a science background would probably be the basic requirements.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo_Johnson#Education

      Eton, Oxford, studied Modern History, Bullingdon Club, friends with... George Osborne. And Boris' brother, of course.

      So much for meritocracy."

      It's much worse than that; he is a completely incompetent obsessive who totally ignores the advice from scientific institutions and distinguished scientists. At least Vince Cable and David Willetts fought the corner for science when they were at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.

      He just doesn't have a clue and all he did was take his science cost-cutting orders from the now-departed Osborne. His current bizarre obsessive priorities are sneakily trying to raise £9k annual tuition fees even more and pointlessly reorganising the research councils which will cost millions and that money would be far better spent on directly supporting research.

      I can only hope that this extreme oaf is moved/sacked as part of the ongoing reshuffle because all he's doing is damaging British science.

  3. Unep Eurobats
    Headmaster

    It's the law, isn't it

    EU rules still apply until we've actually left.

    It's like your wife is divorcing you but you can't stop her using the fridge until the decree nisi comes through granting you custody of the white goods.

    1. Phil Lord

      Re: It's the law, isn't it

      It's like your wife is divorcing you, but you expecting to still have a nice romantic dinner out together till the decree comes in.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It's the law, isn't it

        It is even worse - it is like your wife telling you she plans to leave you when she is ready, but she does not who she wants to be with, or where, but she hopes you can still be friends because you have a nice car/bank account etc..... Not a really a surprise you don't really find this a comforting situation and start to think you ought to jump before you are pushed.....

    2. Voland's right hand Silver badge

      Re: It's the law, isn't it

      Slightly more complicated.

      It is like you and your wife jointly owning a company and your customer performing due diligence on it before signing a 5 year contract for delivery of services.

      I cannot really blame them for having doubts if you have declared in the press that you are about to start divorce proceedings and intend to dissolve the company. They have to be retarded to look at signing a contract with it.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It's the law, isn't it

      But the projects won't start for another 2 or more years, so plenty of time for brexit.

      Lots of these grants require partners from multiple european countries (I think it may be 3). So it's a crazy risk to involve UK universities or businesses who may cease to be european just as your project starts, rendering your whole project ineligible and having to then find a new partner quickly.

      I can't see any other sensible option apart from not including UK organisations until some formal mechanism has been agreed.

      1. Dan 55 Silver badge

        Re: It's the law, isn't it

        Or projects already started before the exit date are funded till their completion.

        Not too difficult.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: It's the law, isn't it

          Dan 55: "Or projects already started before the exit date are funded till their completion.

          Not too difficult."

          So who would underwrite that?

          Europe has already stated the rules - consortia must have organisations from 3 EU member countries. So Europe wouldn't underwrite it.

          The consortia can't underwrite it (otherwise they wouldn't need the grant).

          That only leaves the UK government - who would need to underwrite the entire value of the project for all members, not just the UK members.

          In what way is this "not too difficult"?

          1. Dr Stephen Jones

            Re: It's the law, isn't it

            @AC

            See http://scientistsforbritain.uk/wordpress/?p=232

            The two countries with the highest per-capita EU science funding go to... two countries not in the EU.

    4. Schultz
      Boffin

      "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

      Indeed, and the EU rules require a convincing proposal and budget before multiyear research projects are funded. Nobody wants to waste money on projects that will be unsuccessful because they were cancelled halfway through. Even if this is not topic of the daily headlines, the EU tries very hard not to waste money. It's kind of obvious that research sites that cannot guarantee a stable research environment for the coming years will take a hit in funding. The other EU countries contributing to the EU research budget would be righteously pissed if the EU threw their limited resources into projects without a future.

      1. Baldy50

        Re: "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

        'the EU tries very hard not to waste money'

        "Official auditors have found that the costs of three quarters of the farm projects to protect the landscape and protect biodiversity are “either unreasonably high or insufficiently justified.”

        The EU spent around £860million of public money on the schemes between 2007-13 from its multi-billion pound budget, to which the UK is the second biggest contributor after Germany.

        The findings fuels claims by campaigners for voters to back a Brexit in the forthcoming in/out referendum that Britain’s £8.5billion net contribution to the EU is being wasted on vanity projects and incompetent bureaucracy."

        After visiting 80 per cent of the projects in four different EU states, auditors found only five of the 28 schemes they saw were cost effective.

        It was found that schemes funded in Portugal, Denmark, Italy and the UK did not check whether costs were reasonable or they even accepted the most expensive offer for carrying out work.

        Projects ineligible for funding were also given cash because officials didn’t properly vet proposals.

        This included work on hedging or the restoration of wetlands, while other projects given cash through the scheme included the restoration of dry-stone walls.

        "But Brussels funding for the EU scheme is continuing until 2020 despite the likelihood of more waste because the European Commission and member states are yet to take action to tackle misspending."

        Just a few not including 300 million moving back and to from Brussels to Luxenbourg.

        £155,000 for a top Portuguese golf resort, Monte da Quinta Club.

        £2,200 towards a Bavarian hunting lodge used by Wolfgang Porsche, chairman of Porsche, as part of rural development funds

        £89,000 for an upmarket Spanish hotel chain, Tils Curt, as part of the EU's Regional Development Fund

        £6.3m for the 'Year of Intercultural Dialogue' initiative, which included the Donkeypedia project

        £72,000 to create a virtual Malmo on Second Life

        £760,000 for a 'gender equal' cultural centre, which was never built

        £358,000 for a 'Marathon for a United Europe' to "promote and support European citizen ideals"

        £179 towards a hemp farm

        £358,000 for a project to get children to draw pictures of each other "to develop active European citizenship"

        £178,000 towards a Baltic puppet theatre project.

        The EU would be foolish in to hamper using the resources the UK has to offer with regards to science projects by blocking funding in this country and not include us in collaborative projects.

        1. John Crisp

          Re: "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

          So reform the EU. You have the power (and have had for years) to do something about it.

          You have a legally elected EU parliament. Commisioners who propose law that are put in place by your legally elected government, with oversight of the European Council featuring your PM an elected MP). Overseen (quite rightly) by independent judges, the same as you had in the UK before, and will have again if the UK leaves ( Google 'how the EU works)

          Stop whining and trying to scare people with your media hyped 'sensational' numbers. You can probably prove the moon is made of cheese if you look hard enough for some mumbers.

          How about most of the older voters who voted to leave based on fears of immigration who actually came from areas where there is barely anyone without a white skin and are least affected ? And the 'less well educated' who think 'immigration' took their jobs when in fact a large chunk was due to globalisation, moving production to places like China. The same people who have a house full of Chinese goods cos they like 'cheap' (regrettably lost the link to the study but its out there along with many others)

          Yes the EU needs a kick up the arse, and a shame no one really cared before from the looks of EU election turn out (where your vote counts more due to PR than it does in the UK elections).

          But if you don't like the way it is then vote to change it. Don't just vote to run away. That's what cowards do.

          1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

            Re: "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

            But if you don't like the way it is then vote to change it.

            Anyone who's ever sat in meetings knows that there's a critical number or participants, somewhere around 10, where the law of decreasing returns bites and you get progressively less done because you never get agreement.

            With 28 member countries, all with their own concerns, the EU is way past that point. Members can vote all they like, the chances of ever getting agreement on anything but broad, vague, direction is nil. Which is just the way the commission likes it, it's "Yes, MEP" on a grand scale.

            Don't just vote to run away. That's what cowards do.

            No, it's what pragmatists do. Cowards would just hide in the corner and keep their heads down. Anyone who thinks that taking a decision like Brexit requires cowardice is very confused indeed.

            1. SImon Hobson Bronze badge

              Re: "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

              >> Don't just vote to run away. That's what cowards do.

              > No, it's what pragmatists do.

              Indeed. We've been trying to fix things, but the likes of Junker have made it very very clear that this ship is carrying on, full steam ahead. Ignore the warning of the iceberg ahead (without reform, the whole thing is going to collapse in a horrible mess sooner or later), keep keep full steam ahead on the same course to doom.

              The EU parliament is nothing more than a rubber stamp department. The MEPs have f**k all power - by the time anything gets to them it's set in stone and the only thing they can do is throw the whole thing out, and it has to be really really bad for that to happen. They can issue rebukes, but really all they can do is announce that they don't like something - no-one responsible for whatever mess has any need to actually listen.

              One area I do know a bit about is aviation. "The EU" decided we needed our own regulations and regulator, so EASA was created, and of course they aren't going to sit back and say "well actually lads, we don't need to do much as the current regs (eg JAR and ICAO rules) are near enough. No, they set to with a clean sheet - re-invent not just the wheel, but everything as though the industrial revolution never happened. As a result they created a huge bureaucratic mess - and while the parliament really hated it, the only choice was pass the mess presented, or create a bigger mess with a big hole where aviation regulation should have been. They even went so far as to use quite undiplomatic language in criticising things - but still had little option but to rubber stamp.

              .

              .

              The EU is run by the commissioners - those unelected leaders whose primary qualification seems to be that the electorate in their own country rejected them ! And piles of committees who are similarly unelected and effectively have very little constraint put on them other than ... the obvious one that deciding new regulations aren't actually needed is like turkeys voting for Christmas.

              AIUI, Junkers was made a commissioner after getting kicked out in his own country. Ditto Neil Kinnock.

              Watch this video, it's "quite interesting" !

        2. Captain DaFt

          Re: "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

          Well, this just appalls and disgusts me no end!

          "£179 towards a hemp farm"

          Should've been at least three more digits on that amount!

        3. TheOtherHobbes

          Re: "EU rules still apply until we've actually left."

          >The EU spent around £860million of public money on the schemes between 2007-13 from its multi-billion pound budget, to which the UK is the second biggest contributor after Germany.

          And how does that compare with the >£25bn wasted by the British governments on failed IT projects within the last decade or so?

          Or the very generous terms available during privatisation sell-offs, which deprive the UK's tax payers of further billions from the sale of infrastructure we already own.

          Or the billions "outsourced" in dodgy private contracts for everything from benefits management to school academies to PFI for the NHS?

          Or the billions in uncollected tax from some of our highest earning companies.

          Compared to the UK, the EU is a model of efficiency and honesty.

          They spend money. We burn it alive.

    5. Olius

      Re: It's the law, isn't it

      I think we're all singing from the same flagpole, but just to stick my tuppence in...

      We pay money in to the EU. Science gets grant money from the EU pot.

      At some point, we will stop putting money in to that pot, so we shouldn't get anything out of the pot. Therefore, at the point we leave, we've left.

      So any projects starting now which are "just us" will need to be planned to complete before our exit - and in fact, will get no more money after we exit so definitely will stop dead at our exit.

      Any projects on which we collaborate with other countries are going to have a bit of an upheaval when we suddenly pull out, having left the EU. So probably best for them to start not involving us as soon as possible.

      Someone mentioned Due Diligence - I think this is exactly the right analogy. You wouldn't contract a company for 5 years if you suspect - or know - that they'll be bust in 2 years, when there are many other companies out there which can do the job as well and who you know will still be around.

      So for all these rather sensible reasons, if I were the EU dishing out grants, or a group of Italian scientists looking for some partners, I wouldn't be waiting around for the us Brits to invoke Article 50, let alone the actual leaving date: I would start making arrangements to do less and less work with British scientists starting right now.

      It is staggering to think that when the Remain camp suggested this, it was considered to be "Project FEAR!!!11!! (TM)", when to anyone who put more than a second's thought in to it, it was actually "Project These Really Are The Things Most Likely To Happen, So Let's Not Be Too Hasty And Think This Through A Bit"

      1. veti Silver badge

        Re: It's the law, isn't it

        This is precisely the kind of thing that needs to be negotiated. You know, in the negotiations.

        My suggestion would be, Britain continues paying its bit - maybe overpaying, slightly - for programs that include UK researchers and are already underway at the time of Brexit. When those programs eventually wind down, the payments stop and the government of whatever's-left-of Britain at that time can start running its own R&D subsidies.

        1. werdsmith Silver badge

          Re: It's the law, isn't it

          Just guarantee to underwrite the UK part of the funding from the £350 million per week that the country will have as disposable income after quitting EU........

          Oh wait.....

          You mean there isn't £350m? Oh gawd what am I like!

        2. Trevor_Pott Gold badge

          Re: It's the law, isn't it

          "This is precisely the kind of thing that needs to be negotiated. You know, in the negotiations."

          There will be no negotiating. Listening is what Airstrip One will do. They will obey or they will be left out in the cold to die. End of.

          Exactly what cards do you think Airstrip One holds here? Exactly what does the EU need from Airstrip One that it's politicians would ever be willing to give up? Not a damned thing.

          Airstrip One will leave, it will get fucking nothing, and it can come beg for scraps at the door like everyone else when it is ready to act like a grown up.

          There is absolutely zero benefit to the EU giving Airstrip One a special anything. Actual allies - like Canada - take decades to negotiate trade agreements, and both sides end up making concessions. Airstrip One has a list of demands as long as my leg and no intention of conceding anything. This doesn't help the EU at all.

          If the EU gives an inch to Airstrip One then they are encouraging the other racist xenophobes within the EU, and that's political rukus nobody needs at the moment. Also: any concessions the EU gives Airstrip One could be used against them by other trading partners in their negotiations.

          No...Airstrip One will be made example of. And rightly so.

      2. Dr Stephen Jones

        Re: It's the law, isn't it

        "if I were the EU dishing out grants, or a group of Italian scientists looking for some partners, I wouldn't be waiting around for the us Brits to invoke Article 50, let alone the actual leaving date: I would start making arrangements to do less and less work with British scientists starting right now."

        You don't seem to have a clue.

        Israel and Switzerland participate in EU science projects, receiving funding. Neither is in the EU.

        http://scientistsforbritain.uk/wordpress/?p=232

  4. codejunky Silver badge

    Shock

    So people planning for the future were stuffed because of a spineless leader who not only campaigned for remain but did his level best to ignore the possibility of an out vote and blocked anyone from being ready for the out vote. Hopefully now we have a new PM she will actually lay out a plan and get on with it. It is amusing watching George tell people we are Great Britain not little England, the exact argument used by the globalists in the leave campaign. And the bank of England have also started talking more positive after months of scaremongering.

    Basically the idiots who tried to rig the vote by making any choice but their own punishingly bad are now trying to change their tune without admitting to lying. I really hope May gets on with things and does a good job. I have no idea if she will but that is what we need to end the uncertainty.

    1. Richard 12 Silver badge

      Re: Shock

      Or rather, the people warning that there would be Consequences for voting out have been repeatedly proven correct.

      Would you say the same if I warned you that hacking off your finger is really going to hurt and will make it quite difficult to type, then you did it anyway?

      It's not scaremongering when it's true.

      1. imanidiot Silver badge
        Facepalm

        FUD

        Those warning of consequences where not warning about the voting but about the actual leaving following the possible "leave" outcome of said voting. The results of the actual leaving are yet to happen. Anything short term before article 50 is even invoked is pure FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) based on pretty much nothing at all except "well something MIGHT happen"...

        1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

          Re: FUD

          'Anything short term before article 50 is even invoked is pure FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) based on pretty much nothing at all except "well something MIGHT happen"'

          I think it's based on on "nothing might happen".

        2. Stoneshop
          Facepalm

          Re: FUD

          Anything short term before article 50 is even invoked is pure FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) based on pretty much nothing at all except "well something MIGHT happen"...

          Nope. It's "well, something WILL happen". Even if you lot manage to postpone triggering A50 indefinitely, it's not business as usual any more. Because I doubt that businesses are willing to wait until A50 is invoked, then wait again to see what comes out of the negotiations. It simply won't be as good as being inside the single market, and businesses will want to pre-empt that degradation. So, legally there won't be a difference NOW* and not even until A50 is invoked and its negotiations finalised, but businesses tend to look ahead a number of years to prevent being caught out. Science projects, often being long-running, tend to take the same approach.

          * Some people have been implementing their interpretation of the referendum rather prematurely.

      2. codejunky Silver badge

        Re: Shock

        @ Richard 12

        "Or rather, the people warning that there would be Consequences for voting out have been repeatedly proven correct."

        Have they? Are we having WW3? Or at what time will this start? Is it the end of western civilisation? Do you have a time for that show? What happens when the money men bias a vote by claiming doom gloom and an emergency budget (with no purpose but to destroy) if the wrong answer is given? Would you trust them not to screw up on purpose? The very thing they are insisting they will do? The problem is a PM who will stick around and negotiate- leaving. Chancellor first calling us Little England- now Great Britain. And of course the amusing claims of doom and fear just to get the right answer, and they didnt get it. Btw the unofficial leave campaign was proven right- closer integration, EU army, insane economic policy, Eurozone under threat.

        "Would you say the same if I warned you that hacking off your finger is really going to hurt and will make it quite difficult to type, then you did it anyway?"

        Interesting how the very people to claim the economy will be damaged are the ones who damaged it and then blame brexit. How do we have economic confidence in people purposefully and wilfully damaging our economy? And now they try to undo the damage they caused by saying exactly what we were saying in the first place.

        "It's not scaremongering when it's true."

        Not a prediction when you describe the damage you cause yourself but then try to blame other circumstances. And if it wasnt scaremongering then they must be lying now as they start to talk more positively (while trying not to admit their scaremongering).

        1. werdsmith Silver badge

          Re: Shock

          Interesting how the very people to claim the economy will be damaged are the ones who damaged it and then blame brexit. How do we have economic confidence in people purposefully and wilfully damaging our economy? And now they try to undo the damage they caused by saying exactly what we were saying in the first place.

          Who should I believe then? Some random bloke on the Register forums, or Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England (post-Brexit statements).

          Hmmm, let me think.... (strokes imaginary beard).

          1. codejunky Silver badge

            Re: Shock

            @ werdsmith

            "Who should I believe then? Some random bloke on the Register forums, or Mark Carney, governor of the Bank of England (post-Brexit statements)."

            You should absolutely believe Mark Carney but at what point? Do you believe him when he was rigging the vote and claiming we are doomed or do you believe his softer, less dooming comments after the vote? You could believe Osborne at how doomed we are before the vote, or his 'not little england but great britain' speech after. Are you saying Mark is more believable now or when he was trying to rig the vote?

            You can believe such experts but you will have to note every time what point in recent history you are believing just so anything previous can be dismissed. I also hear the punishment budget (if we vote the wrong way Osborne was going to sink the country in spite) has been taken out back and shot. It had no support before brexit and even less now.

            Of course there are questions over our economy. Osborne, Cameron, Carney are running, fired and changing minds so quick nobody could possibly know what they honestly thing. Hopefully we now get some stable leadership. Hopefully it will also be good.

            And I dont need to imagine, I am stroking my very real beard and it feels good.

            1. Intractable Potsherd

              Re: Shock @codejunky

              "Hopefully we now get some stable leadership. Hopefully it will also be good."

              Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary - your hopes were in vain.

            2. Chris 239

              Re: Shock

              Why would Mark Carney try to rig the vote? He can bail and get a job anywhere for probably more money than we pay him as governor of the BoE.

              (PS the remain camp obviously did not rig the vote or they would have won!)

              You are an ignorant twat.

              1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                Happy

                Re: Chris 239 Re: Shock

                ".....the remain camp obviously did not rig the vote....." Hmmm, a very debatable point. For a start, they tried to stack the vote by allowing non-UK citizens from Ireland, Malta and Cyprus (all in the EU) that lived in the UK to vote, along with the population of Gibraltar (gee, I wonder which way all those were likely to vote?). They also did so little to register ex-pats living outside the EU it seemed like a blatant attempt to deny them the vote, saying if they hadn't been UK residents for 15 years then they were not allowed to vote. That meant you had pensioners living in Spain that had lived and paid taxes in the UK for sixty-plus years refused the right to vote, yet someone from Ireland that had moved to the UK only months before could! And then, after non-UK EU citizens resident in the UK had been told they would not be allowed to vote (much to Remain's annoyance), there was the strange "glitch" that meant many of them received polling cards anyway because some councils simply copied their names off the electoral rolls and straight into the polling lists.

                You could probably take a million off the Remain vote figure for the above, but, as you say, it doesn't matter because Leave won.

                1. Lotaresco

                  Re: Chris 239 Shock

                  "For a start, they tried to stack the vote by allowing non-UK citizens from Ireland, Malta and Cyprus (all in the EU) that lived in the UK to vote"

                  No, that was the electoral commission. The same electoral commission that denied a vote to between 2-3 million UK nationals resident in Europe.

              2. codejunky Silver badge

                Re: Shock

                @ Chris 239

                "Why would Mark Carney try to rig the vote? He can bail and get a job anywhere for probably more money than we pay him as governor of the BoE."

                And yet with those options he chooses BoE. And why not if that is what he wants to do. Maybe it helps to be on side with the gov, maybe he had other reasons but he did try to rig the vote and was called out by Rees-Mogg concerning his seriously one sided opinions. Only a short time before the vote Mark was pointing out the huge problem that is the EU then suddenly that view disappeared when the 'acceptable line' was decided. At no point did he mention the positives of leaving (his predecessor did) and he joined in the over egging of the doom. Interestingly now he has changed his tune again and the absolute doom is now risks and opportunities.

                "(PS the remain camp obviously did not rig the vote or they would have won!)"

                Erm, eh? The gov and the EU joined to drown out the leave campaign particularly by using government funds to junk mail the population. They know the size of the population but miraculously the server to register to vote falls only 1 hour before deadline and so they break the rules and extend by 2 days + up the campaigning. Cameron was the PM who was going nowhere and so would negotiate with the EU etc but refused to do any such discussion about leave, only remain (a non-binding agreement for minor changes Cameron boasted about to be voted out after a remain vote). Btw only the PM can action Article 50. Even Osborne insisted he would implement a punishment budget on the population of they voted wrong. Nobody supported it and he dropped it when his threat failed.

                After that and more you call me ignorant? Ha.

      3. fruitoftheloon
        Stop

        @Richard 12: Re: Shock

        Richard,

        Could it be a little premature to hoist the 'every sh!t thing we predicted has happened' flag?

        Otoh I understand that quite a few French fisheryfolk are quite nervous.

        Ooi wifey is a physicist.

        Cheers,

        Jay

        1. Paul Shirley

          Re: @Richard 12: Shock

          Otoh I understand that quite a few French fisheryfolk are quite nervous.

          I suspect they'll be less nervous than you think since most uk fishermen sold their licences, quotas and boats long ago. That's going to be a mess to untangle even if enough people can be persuaded to risk their lives at sea again.

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Shock

      "Hopefully now we have a new PM she will actually lay out a plan and get on with it."

      I take it you were a Leaver. Don't you have any suggestions as to what a good plan would be? Other than hoping that the existing incumbents would be able to think of something which, AFAICS must have been one of the Leavers' plans; the other being "magic happens".

      1. codejunky Silver badge

        Re: Shock

        @ Doctor Syntax

        "I take it you were a Leaver. Don't you have any suggestions as to what a good plan would be?"

        From our previous exchanges I thought you would know by now I absolutely voted leave. First good move is to get rid of the doom singers, their credibility is shot and their certainty of our failure was to nail themselves to the remain campaign. Hold the Article 50 negotiations over the EU. They are about to reap shocks and problems they created, it will make the hostile less capable while our friends (the ones who need us) will be more willing to talk. While the EU wont talk without Article 50, the line of countries wanting to trade are already talking to us. Get on with it and start drawing plans, that way when we pull out we are already started. Burn the excessive EU regs (or all and start over) and go pro-growth, pro-job, pro-freedom which will continue to rip businesses from the EU. Anyone who is here already (from the EU) has nothing to worry about, end the uncertainty. The only uncertainties should be what the EU refuse to discuss. And of course put people knowledgeable of the EU but wanting out in the negotiations for Brexit (Farage & co).

        By the time we are out it will be another GE and the people can choose the direction of the country.

        "Other than hoping that the existing incumbents would be able to think of something which, AFAICS must have been one of the Leavers' plans; the other being "magic happens"."

        There are a lot of leavers (the majority!) and there is a huge range of reasons from the racist to the globalist. If the remain crowd honestly want world trade and to be inclusive then they have to work with the globalists, give up on the vote they lost and work towards the victory of a global, inclusive and successful country.

        1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

          Re: Shock

          "From our previous exchanges I thought you would know by now I absolutely voted leave."

          Indeed. Maybe you didn't read my last post on a previous exchange - what with one thing and another I got round to it pretty late. If you had you'd realise that I'm not an outstanding fan of the EU, it's just that I think the idea that we can just walk out to be an economic nonsense. At least we're not in the Euro.

          "By the time we are out it will be another GE and the people can choose the direction of the country."

          Our ability to choose the direction will be restricted. What if the choice at that point would have been to remain - as it might well be if all those businesses here for an EU base have started to migrate? That choice would be gone. If the choice is a trade treaty with the EU then it will be on the EU's terms. The choice of being an imperial power is long gone. The choice of being a major world power hasn't existed for the last 60 years, post Suez.

          1. codejunky Silver badge

            Re: Shock

            @ Doctor Syntax

            "Maybe you didn't read my last post on a previous exchange - what with one thing and another I got round to it pretty late"

            I do hope all is well. I may have caught your comment I am not sure. If I missed something feel free to point me in the right direction.

            "If you had you'd realise that I'm not an outstanding fan of the EU, it's just that I think the idea that we can just walk out to be an economic nonsense."

            Thats your view and thats fine, but I definitely disagree. The Eurozone is an economic disaster as is hitting home again, and why would we want to be tied to such a toxic problem? A lot of the world is doing much better and we gain nothing by excluding ourselves from it. The EU is increasingly looking inward and has constantly been predicted to fall. Instead of falling they just sacrificed another of their member countries. We can do better.

            "Our ability to choose the direction will be restricted"

            Not really. There are compromises as opportunity costs but we were losing out by being part of the EU anyway.

            "as it might well be if all those businesses here for an EU base have started to migrate"

            If the businesses wanted to be in the EU why are they here? There is a whole EU and they are here. Because of our opt outs? A working currency? The talent and capability? And when we leave we dont need to carry the regulatory insanity of bananas. So some who are absolutely dependent on the EU will leave. Others may set up an office in the EU to claim residence. Our actions will decide how enticing our country will be.

            "If the choice is a trade treaty with the EU then it will be on the EU's terms"

            There are 2 good suggestions on this. 1 no deal on their bad terms. that is what we voted to get away from. 2 we have a trade deficit with them, they want to sell to us, they want us. Add their pending economic situation (probably worse than it already is!) and there is hope they will make their terms acceptable.

            "The choice of being a major world power hasn't existed for the last 60 years."

            This seems similar to the imperial power comment. In Europe we have been doing better than most, particularly due to the eurozone. We can easily make trade deals like everyone else, except the EU who takes ages due to its members. We are not nobody, we are not insignificant and we dont need to hide from the world behind a failing economic block. We are not little England unless we retreat from the world.

      2. tfewster
        Joke

        Re: "magic happens"

        Don't be silly, of course there was a proper plan, even if codejunky hasn't been let in on it.

        Step 1: Vote for Brexit

        Step 2: ????

        Step 3: Profit!

        If Step 3 is not achieved, then:

        Step 4: Blame the Remainers

  5. Bogle
    Joke

    Oh really?

    Quick, we must fund a study into the late use of security implementations for large agricultural building portals where there has been a recent, rapid equine absconding. Please make out grant applications in triplicate to the Dept of the Bleeding Obvious. No, not you, Franz.

  6. Panicnow

    Look to elsewhere (e.g. China and India) PLEASE!

    The EU funding system is corrupt and ineffective anyway. Look for world leading partners elsewhere. Avoid the bureaucratic and political pollution of science meted out by Brussels

    1. Hollerithevo

      Re: Look to elsewhere (e.g. China and India) PLEASE!

      I agree that the EU is corrupt. That is a big elephant not yet tackled properly. But you'd avoid a corrupt organisation in Europe to go to...China? That bastion of transparency, meritocracy and level playing fields??? With India not too far behind?

      1. codejunky Silver badge

        Re: Look to elsewhere (e.g. China and India) PLEASE!

        @ Hollerithevo

        China- working to reduce corruption and branch into the world trade.

        India- working to reduce corruption and branch into the world trade.

        EU- working to consolidate their power from the people, destroying their own member countries and excluding world trade due to the rules of the cartel.

        Or of course growing economies vs the eurozone, inflation vs fighting off deflation, increasing global relevance vs reducing global relevance. Panicnow has a point

        1. Sandtitz Silver badge

          Re: Look to elsewhere (e.g. China and India) PLEASE!

          "China/India- working to reduce corruption and branch into the world trade."

          Zimbabwe and Russia - working to reduce corruption and branch into the world trade!

          So far India's and China's promises have been lip service. Transparency International deems in their reports that corruption in China or India isn't diminishing. The Indian court system is famous for being slow.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judiciary_of_India#Pendency_of_cases

        2. Intractable Potsherd

          Re: Look to elsewhere (e.g. China and India) PLEASE! @codejunky

          I really don't recognise the world you live in. Are you from an alternative dimension?

          1. codejunky Silver badge

            Re: Look to elsewhere (e.g. China and India) PLEASE! @codejunky

            @ Intractable Potsherd

            "I really don't recognise the world you live in. Are you from an alternative dimension?"

            No. And I am sorry you dont recognise the world we live in.

  7. Adam Christie-Grant

    Such a surprise

    And with Europe being so corrupt while Britain with the lords (50K for membership right?) and HSBC being such bastions of light lets lay into the ba$stards in Europe.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Such a surprise

      "And with Europe being so corrupt while Britain with the lords (50K for membership right?"

      If I lived in Zone 1, £100k or so invested in a peerage would give a lot more ROI than a solar farm or a pension fund, and somewhere nice to sleep in the afternoon. Unfortunately where I am travel costs would make it only breakeven.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Devil

    'twas ever thus ...

    ... well, kind-of.

    I spent most of the '90s working at a European (not EU - membership is much wider than that) Big Science institution.

    Like most Brits there, I was a contractor supplied by an outsourcing company. A second-class citizen.

    This situation was blamed on the fact that UK financial contributions were miserly. The vast majority of the real jobs went to those countries who put the most money in.

  9. Wommit

    The 'Remainers' on this forum should look at quite recent history. The Euro nearly failed with the Greeks budgeting (or rather not budgeting) crisis. Italy has also become shaky, Spain is desperate for any foreign currency income. The EUs budgets haven't been signed off by their auditors at all. And you lot want to stay joined with them.

    And who now remembers the ERM crisis, 16th Sept 1992? The day that interest rates rocketed to 27%. When The UK was unable to devalue the pound because of the European treaties prevented the Pound from falling below 6% of it's current value. That treaty cost the UK 3.3Billion Pounds! If the Pound had been devalued, the UK could have made a 2.4 Billion Pound profit. I remember watching the news, thinking that I was going to lose everything my Wife & I had worked for. Everything. Are you sure you want to remain?

    I wonder how long the Germans will allow the Euro to exist, they are paying dearly for their attempts at European Federalisation.

    Those of us who remember what the UK was like before we entered the EEC (note EEC not the EU, that came by stealth later,) would like to go back to those times. Not the rickets and workhouses before anyone suggests them, but making our own laws, be they stupid or saintly. Deciding for ourselves the direction our country is to go in. Call me a racist bigot if you like (I'm not, but I don't care what you call me; be careful of the libel laws though) but I would like us to have full control of our own borders too.

    The absolute shock from our political "servants" at the result of this referendum just shows how out of touch the ruling classes were and still are.

    Please remember that the future isn't fixed. If we fuck up, well it's our fuck up. No one else's. Can you honestly say that if we did / do remain?

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      "Those of us who remember what the UK was like before we entered the EEC ...Deciding for ourselves the direction our country is to go in."

      I certainly remember those times. A good many people who want to go back to them seem to think we were still a great imperial power. We weren't. Our ability to decide effectively was pretty well finished when Eden declined to show two fingers to the US in '56.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Joke

        Maybe, but we could still Invade Europe, May & Putin together with most of Europe playing Poland

    2. Lars Silver badge
      Happy

      "Those of us who remember what the UK was like before we entered the EEC ".

      Yes, I was younger then too, my deity, the cars, the girls, the air. It was indeed much better then, but to day my old father comes to my mind who tried to have a positive look at the world and claimed he was able to piss higher and higher the older he got. Eventually he was able to reach his toes but years older he reached up to his knees.

    3. Lotaresco

      "Those of us who remember what the UK was like before we entered the EEC (note EEC not the EU, that came by stealth later,) would like to go back to those times."

      I remember clearly what the UK was like before we entered the EEC, words and phrases that come to mind are bankrupt, IMF, on our knees, strikes, more strikes, lunatic unions, lazy workforce, industrial sabotage, failing, filthy, polluted, sexist, dead end, brain drain, massive losses.

      All of the Brexiters talk drivel about "going back" apparently unaware that time machines still don't exist and that going back isn't possible or even desirable. The UK within the EU was a good place to be. The EU under UKIP or a UKIP influenced Tory party is set to be an awful place that caters for the narrow-minded Reginald Molehusbands of this world.

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        "IMF"

        Actually, that was later, but in light of what had gone before, pretty well inevitable.

  10. lukewarmdog

    Might be reading a different article but

    If you have non-anecdotal evidence of brexit discrimination against science funding, there is someone you can tell who can look at the legality of it. We can now knock off the "brexit totally screwed science funding, like I said it would" nonsense now. Secret report by the Russell group? Oh please.

    As for future projects and divorce.. No. U.K. Universities it might shock you to hear attract Italians and Germans and Chinese scientists at the highest levels to world class facilities that don't exist in their own countries. U.K. Unis run globally respected research and Brexit doesn't nullify that, people still want to fund and do research here so it will carry on. Nation states and global multinationals do their due diligence and continue research in Oxford Edinburgh Manchester Bath - wherever the cutting edge research is coming out of.

  11. a cynic writes...

    Can I just check I have this right..

    There's EU funding mechanisms for research open to non-EU members (eg Switzerland, Israel). There's anecdotal evidence that despite the fact that we're still members funding is getting knocked back because:

    (1) people don't know our long term membership position of the funding arrangements. (which is fair enough)

    (2) the people involved in the evaluation stage playing politics. Which we know they do since according to the Guardian article they started downgrading Swiss research after a referendum to restrict immigration.

    So (1) should be fixable by joining Horizon 2020 et.al as non-EU members. Fixing (2) depends on how long grown adults will sulk. Based on my experience, sometime around the turn of the century then.

    1. Paul Shirley

      Re: Can I just check I have this right..

      Some of what seems to be happening is individual researchers are either refusing to come here OR planning to leave, based on the hostile reactions now common from xenophobes. That's the consequence of 'leave' recruiting them to their campaign, it was a choice made by cynical scum afraid they might lose otherwise.

      Since part of the purpose of EU grants is to encourage collaboration across Europe, if the people doing the collaboration refuse, there's not much point handing out the grants to the UK institutions. Ultimately the money follows the people and England is a pretty frightening place right now.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Can I just check I have this right..

      You don't have it completely right.

      The key problem for Horizon is that consortia (in the main) need to be from 3 EU Member countries.

      Suppose that I am a German university putting together a consortium. I need to find organisations in 2 other countries. If I choose a UK organisation, I risk spending a year or more putting together the proposal (and spending money doing so) then finding my consortium collapses as UK leaves Europe and my consortium is no longer valid. I then have to either write off all the money I've spent, and sack some of my staff - or sink more money scrabbling around trying to find a replacement.

      What possible reason would I have for introducing such financial and staffing risk into my organisation, when it can be avoided by not partnering with UK organisations?

      1. veti Silver badge

        Re: Can I just check I have this right..

        Well, ideally, you'd be including a UK organisation because that organisation had the best people and experience for the work you want to do.

        If it doesn't, then why include it? If the answer is "just to qualify for EU funding", then that would explain a lot about the generally glacial pace of EU R&D over the past 30 years.

        On the other hand - if it does have that expertise, then you'd be an idiot to exclude it just because the political status of the UK is likely to change.

        This is a positive thing, folks. It's one less factor distorting the award of money based on arbitrary political rules instead of - well, any real reason.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Can I just check I have this right..

          On the other hand - if it does have that expertise, then you'd be an idiot to exclude it just because the political status of the UK is likely to change.

          Actually, I would be an idiot to plan a new collaboration with a UK-based colleague using funds which I know will dry up the moment brexit goes through halfway through the project: who's going to pay my staff and cover the expendables at that point?

          Don't get me wrong: I know many excellent scientists working in the UK (and some of them are even UK citizens and hence likely to stay in the aftermath of this mess). I will continue to collaborate with them as best as I could, because they truly are superb at what they do. At the same time, both myself and my UK colleagues are bound by the realities of life - one of which is that the EU funding was enabling many of these projects. Now this funding is effectively off the table, even if UK is formally a fully-fledged EU member until article 50 negotiations complete.

          I did not choose this situation, but I have to live with it the best I could.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Can I just check I have this right..

          Veti: "Well, ideally, you'd be including a UK organisation because that organisation had the best people and experience for the work you want to do."

          It's not that there's one perfect fit. There will be a few organisations which are good fits in different ways, just like any other selection process. Instead of going for the UK organisation which is weak in area X, they will go for the French organisation which is weak in area Y.

        3. Paul Shirley

          Re: Can I just check I have this right..

          if it does have that expertise

          Not if but while the UK has the experts, science is done by people not institutions, a great many of them foreign. ATM the UK has refused to give any enforceable guarantee on their status and done nothing at all to suppress the frothing europhobe mob Boris,Farage and the press barons incited.

          For the ROW it's a time for caution dealing with little Britain, not carrying on hoping for the best while the brexiters delay and try to game brexit. Boris needs to be in Brussels today hand delivering A50 notification, he's only fit to be a messenger boy.

    3. Baldy50

      Re: Can I just check I have this right..

      http://www.algemeiner.com/2016/07/19/israels-defense-industry-will-suffer-severe-blow-if-jerusalem-agrees-to-new-terms-of-us-military-aid-package-national-security-expert-says-interview/

      For anyone’s perusal if interested.

  12. YARR
    Megaphone

    We should take this as a clear signal that the UK is not wanted in Europe. Rather than leave our scientists in limbo for 2+ years, the UK government needs to immediately expand UK science funding to take over from the European system and minimise disruption.

    If Europe intends to block UK science funding that we are committed to paying into until Brexit, that is a good reason to NOT offer guarantees to European scientists currently based here. It's nothing personal - it's just politics. I look forward to when this period is over and the UK is back to funding it's own research again, and developing it's own talent.

    This begs the question of why our politicians ever signed us up to Europe against the will of the people, when it is obvious that joining then leaving would cause such disruption when compared to not joining at all.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      It's not just about money - science can't exist in isolation. The UK can't develop world-leading research, without working with other countries.

      I had the opportunity to work on a project with the European Space Agency, as part of a project involving Germany and Italy. Are you suggesting that leaving the EU will free up enough funding for the UK to start a space programme?

      One of my friends was involved in work with the Large Hadron Collider - are you proposing we set up our own particle accelerator somewhere under Birmingham?

      1. YARR

        "The UK can't develop world-leading research, without working with other countries""

        So are you saying UK scientists can't collaborate without the EU? Does this mean there are no non-EU scientists in the UK? Why do we need to be part of the EU (which is really a project to create a European superstate without admitting that to the electorate) in order to collaborate?

        ""Are you suggesting that leaving the EU will free up enough funding for the UK to start a space programme?""

        We could to some degree - it may not make economic sense to develop our own rockets now. Russia and India have space programmes, look at the size of their economies compared to the UK. How do they afford it?

        ""are you proposing we set up our own particle accelerator""

        The LHC is primarily in Switzerland which is not in the EU and has cancelled it's application to join. Are you saying that outside the EU we cannot work with Switzerland, despite having contributed to the LHC funding?

        1. Lars Silver badge
          Happy

          @YARR

          "Russia and India have space programmes, look at the size of their economies compared to the UK. How do they afford it?".

          Perhaps you are not quite up to date with the size of economies.

          COUNTRY COMPARISON :: GDP (PURCHASING POWER PARITY)

          Rank Country GDP (PURCHASING POWER PARITY) Date of Information

          1 China $19,390,000,000,000 2015 est.

          2 European Union $19,180,000,000,000 2015 est.

          3 United States $17,950,000,000,000 2015 est.

          4 India $7,965,000,000,000 2015 est.

          5 Japan $4,830,000,000,000 2015 est.

          6 Germany $3,841,000,000,000 2015 est.

          7 Russia $3,718,000,000,000 2015 est.

          8 Brazil $3,192,000,000,000 2015 est.

          9 Indonesia $2,842,000,000,000 2015 est.

          10 United Kingdom $2,679,000,000,000 2015 est.

          11 France $2,647,000,000,000 2015 est.

          12 Mexico $2,227,000,000,000 2015 est.

          13 Italy $2,171,000,000,000 2015 est.

          https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2001rank.html

          And apparently the Brexit has already caused this text too:

          "The UK, a leading trading power and financial center, is the third largest economy in Europe after Germany and France".

      2. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

        I had the opportunity to work on a project with the European Space Agency, as part of a project involving Germany and Italy. Are you suggesting that leaving the EU will free up enough funding for the UK to start a space programme?

        The ESA is not an EU institution, and funding is separate from the EU, the UK contributes to ESA. The UK has a space programme, worth around £6 billion per year at present, with a strategy in place to considerably increase that (6-fold) by 2035.

        One of my friends was involved in work with the Large Hadron Collider - are you proposing we set up our own particle accelerator somewhere under Birmingham?

        The LHC is in CERN, which is under Geneva, Switzerland. Switzerland is not a member of the EU. It's a much nicer place than Birmingham so I suggest we continue to work with CERN, Brexit or not.

        1. Lotaresco
          FAIL

          "The LHC is in CERN, which is under Geneva, Switzerland."

          Well no, but thanks for playing. Not one bit of the LHC is under Geneva and most of it is France, not Switzerland. The control centre is in France. Here's a map.

          Location of the LHC

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Last time I visited I was definitely in Switzerland. Doesn't the URL Cern.ch give you a clue?

            1. Lotaresco

              "Last time I visited I was definitely in Switzerland. Doesn't the URL Cern.ch give you a clue?"

              Didn't a great big map give you a clue about where the LHC is located?

              The claim made was the LHC was beneath Geneva, it isn't. Also "cern.ch" isn't a URL it's a domain.

              This is a URL: http://cds.cern.ch/record/841532/files/lhc-pho-1998-337.jpg?version=1 note how it shows that the LHC is (a) not under Geneva, (b) mostly in France.

              As I said:

              "Not one bit of the LHC is under Geneva and most of it is France, not Switzerland."

              Perhaps the word "most" is giving you problems?

              There are 8 control sites for the LHC, of which two: Meyrin and Ornex are in Switzerland, the remaining six: Sergy / Saint-Genis-Pouilly, Crozet, Echenevex, Cessy, Versonnex and Ferney-Voltaire are in France.

    2. Paul Shirley

      @YARR

      You have an astonishingly amnesiac memory of UK government support for basic science. Gove epitomised it by openly rejecting 'experts', the only service the worthless cnut has offered. Left to any of the last 43 years governments we'd now be experts at better ways to whittle spoons and the best way to wrap fancy paper around imported technology.

    3. Doctor Syntax Silver badge
      Unhappy

      "the UK government needs to immediately expand UK science funding"

      Something no UK govt of any colour has ever done outside of wartime.

  13. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    "This begs the question of why our politicians ever signed us up to Europe against the will of the people"

    It clearly does.

    '"Begging the question" is a form of logical fallacy in which a statement or claim is assumed to be true without evidence other than the statement or claim itself. When one begs the question, the initial assumption of a statement is treated as already proven without any logic to show why the statement is true in the first place.' ( http://begthequestion.info/ )

    Your statement that joining was against the the will of the people falls foul of http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/june/6/newsid_2499000/2499297.stm

    1. YARR

      "Begging the question" is not a logical fallacy itself but assuming an unproven statement to be true is.

      Your link clearly shows the 1975 referendum asked if we wanted to stay in (not "join") the EEC because our politicians had already signed us up to it without a democratic mandate. The same applies to every European treaty signed since that takes more power away from member countries and hands that power to the EEC/EU/United States of Europe. The 1975 referendum did not affirm that the UK public wanted to give away their national sovereignty because that was not the question asked. Nor did it confirm that we wanted our universities and research institutions to be centrally funded from Europe. Nor did it confirm that we want a European army to eventually displace national armed forces, take control of our nuclear weapons and supplant our membership within NATO.

      1. Paul Shirley

        And your reply ignores that the UK had already had its application rejected enough years before getting in for the voters to veto it in this perverse mockery of democracy if they actually objected.

        You can argue the thing morphed after joining, that the serially useless governments ignored electors like they ALWAYS DO. Don't pretend they were tricked into joining. Especially not to those of us that were there at the time.

      2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        "our politicians had already signed us up to it without a democratic mandate."

        Nevertheless we were then asked for a mandate to continue and gave it.

        "The 1975 referendum did not affirm that the UK public wanted to give away their national sovereignty etc"

        You know as well as I do that the nature of a referendum question is that it wraps all the individual negotiating points into a single question and:

        "The same applies to every European treaty signed since that takes more power away from member countries and hands that power to the EEC/EU/United States of Europe."

        I completely agree with you. I think every EEC/EU country should have held a referendum to enable its government to ratify all the succeeding countries. I also think the referenda should have required a substantive majority, say 2/3rds, to change the status quo, just as I think this recent referendum should have required it. Such a requirement would have caused the negotiators to have come up with much different treaties if they wanted to get them though. In fact we may still have had the EEC in place.

        You should realise that my position isn't what you think it is. I think there's a great deal wrong with the EU but that walking away is just plain nuts on economic grounds. I don't think that the great economic opportunities that the leavers are hoping for are there.

        If we try to retain the foreign investment that's here because of our EU membership we'll have to retain all the other aspects of the EU that you don't like but with one difference - we won't be part of the decision-making process so this much-vaunted regaining of "control" or "sovereignty" won't just be a chimera, it'll be the opposite of what you claim. In this respect the Leavers have scored a massive own goal.

        The globalist option is going to involve trying to negotiate our own trade treaties with existing players. Again, our degree of control is severely limited. You have to ask what they're wanting and whether it's going to be to our advantage. The likes of India are going to be looking for even more off-shoring. As for the US - look at their recent "partnership" negotiations; they're clearly commercial colonisation acts intended to put US corporations in much the same situation as the East India Company once occupied in India. Any "deal" we get there is going to be a lot worse than what was being negotiated with the EU.

        We've simply cut off our own economic nose to spite the EU's political face.

  14. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    In other news

    I see from the Beeb site that David Davis is to be Brexit minister. Given his previous position on privacy maybe he'll manage to retain the EUs rules on this. It might go some way to offsetting May as PM.

    1. tfewster
      Go

      Re: In other news

      Interesting lineup. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-36785814 has a handy reminder of their backgrounds and which side of the campaign they were on. It seems the Brexit campaigners have been been given the tasks of turning their vision into reality, so there can be no complaints of them sabotaging it.

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: In other news

        BoJo in the FCO should be ... interesting. As one comment on there said, he'll probably spend most of his time apologising to countries he's insulted.

      2. tfewster
        Facepalm

        Re: In other news

        More Brexiter appointments:

        Andrea Loathsome @ DEFRA, to progress ratification of the Paris climate change treaty

        Priti Patel - International Development Secretary. Make sure we've got a non-European source of plumbers, fruit-pickers and hotel staff - priti please?

        On the surface, it appears Theresa May _does_ have a sense of humour.

  15. Matt Bryant Silver badge
    Facepalm

    Reality check.

    "....the University of Glasgow was having a hard time attracting a “top physicist”...." I'm guessing the locale was actually more of a deterrent. Of course, the unmentioned good news is that this means more chance an actual local physicist will get the job rather than some EUer.

  16. Sirius Lee

    "..which said that the University of Glasgow was having a hard time attracting a “top physicist” because.."

    Or it was an excuse not to have to live in Glasgow. A "top physicist" might have a range of options and other options may make Glasgow an unappealing place to spend the next few years. It certainly would not appeal to me. But, yes, of course, it must be because of Brexit. What else could it be?

    1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Re: Sirius Lee - downvoters need a reality check.

      "....Or it was an excuse not to have to live in Glasgow...." All the downvoters need to stop and admit something - if they had to draw up a list of the ten cities in Europe they would most like to live and work in, I'm pretty sure places like Barcelona, Madrid, Rome, even Rejkjavik, would appear much, much, much more frequently than Glasgow (and that's making the generous presumption it would appear at all!).

      Yes, I have worked in Glasgow and, no, it would not appear on my list. Barcelona, from personal experience, would probably be my number one choice.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Brexit has cut short my funding

    I was due to join an EU research programme to set standards for telematics and vehicle electronics security. Unsurprisingly I have been told that I cannot join the programme because of Brexit. The UK will probably be out of the EU before the end of the three year funding cycle.

    Gee, thanks Brexiters.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Brexit has cut short my funding

      programme to set standards for telematics and vehicle electronics security.

      That sounds like something which would have to be international, going well beyond the EU, perhaps under an ISO mandate? There may well be other non-EU ways to get into such a programme.

  18. Tom 7

    BoJo is going to be Foreign monster.

    I think we should do the decent thing and start building a wall round ourselves.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Go

      Re: BoJo is going to be Foreign monster.

      A wall around BoJo, or more usefully around Westminster - The Great Wall of Westminster has a certain 'ring' about it.

  19. Matt Bryant Silver badge
    Devil

    Scientists - just too "ethical"?

    A lot of the scaremongering expressed in this thread revolves around the idea bitter EUers will use the uncertainty of Brexit to chop British scientists out of long-term projects. They probably will, they may not, but I've always been taught to quit moaning about the issue and start looking for a solution. I'm guessing that the ivory-tower-dwelling scientific community are simply too detached from the nasty, devious World that consultants live in not to be prepared for this, but it looks like time to introduce you to incremental selling.

    If a project looks to be a long-term commitment and requires a big funding commitment, it's not unusual for businesses to baulk at the idea of paying for it up front. You may find there are budget thresholds above which more committees and decision-makers have to be involved, usually leading to even more delays. The way around this is to break the project down into smaller, incremental projects and sell it on the basis that you can stop or transfer the work after the first stage. The reality is, once funds have been sunk into that first stage, it will be harder for the business to resist signing off on the next small budget for stage 2, and so on (this is especially true with government organisations which are fearful of news articles painting them as "wasteful"). And every stage completed gives you the twin arguments of success and experience.

    So, if some lEUser is denying you budget or participation because you are looking at a five-year project, simply see what you can get done in the two years likely between the Article 50 declaration and the end of negotiations, try and break it down into smaller lumps, then go ask for commitment to those smaller projects. You'll be asking for a smaller lump then the EU competitors, who will have priced for the full project, and if you have segmented the work correctly you can claim it will be easy to switch future tasks to an EU-based team. No matter how many scientists are involved in the decision-making, at some point there will be an unscientific bean-counter, and to him your lower cost will resonate. Of course, once the work is started, it has momentum and you can start banking the learned knowledge that makes it harder to transfer the work to another team, and the same bean-counter will be looking at the small increment in budget for stage 2....

    /Come to the Dark Side, we have cookies!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Scientists - just too "ethical"?

      I don't think you really understand how scientific research is conducted. Scientists collaborate for years at a time and at the end you'll try to publish in a prestigious journal with your name attached to the work. Not making any arguments for Leave or Remain, but the scenario you outlined is not realistic. Science is not a business. Most scientists, especially the ones doing "basic" research, the kind of math-tastic, extremely intellectually difficult work about how messaging proteins work, etc, the sort that informs "broader" stuff higher up the chain in cancer research – they don't make a lot of money. They will never be able to buy a house in London or even Glasgow, much less rent one in a good area. They don't do it for the money. Most are pursuing the prize of recognition or respect. Breaking projects down into "time chunks" “banking the learned knowledge”… it is just not how these projects work. It’s not software development. You spend half your life begging for a stupid grant so you can spend the other half using your brain and, if you're really lucky, getting to solve very difficult problems. With all due respect, Mr Bryant, you don't know what you're talking about.

      1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
        Boffin

        Re: AC Re: Scientists - just too "ethical"?

        "I don't think you really understand how scientific research is conducted...." Oh, I do understand how research is conducted, but I also know that has SFA to do with how funding decisions are made. Behind every team of boffins earnestly peering into their Petri dishes is a bureaucracy that actually controls who gets what in terms of money, staff and facilities. When someone in Cambridge decides they want to do a project with their scientist buddies in Helsinki, Berlin and Prague, they have to get approval from someone else to spend the money. Even at universities there will be a committee that signs off on research grants, and they will not all be scientists, they will largely be administrators. I have built new research sites up from green fields to finished labs and datacenter halls, I have seen how the money gets passed out, and the people making the final decisions often don't even have science degrees.

        ".....Science is not a business...." Er, yes it is! It is big business, whether it is run as university research or by big conglomerates like GlaxoSmithKline. Universities have long since switched themselves over to be being businesses rather than just recipients of government largesse. I'm not surprised you might have missed that seeing as organisations like RCUK (assigning 3bn quid of research funding every year in the UK) are there in the background to take away as much of the funding red-tape as possible, allowing the scientists to get on with their research.

    2. Lotaresco
      WTF?

      Re: Scientists - just too "ethical"?

      " the ivory-tower-dwelling scientific community"

      If anyone needed proof that you don't know what you are talking about, that's it, there.

      As an (ex) scientist close to retirement and diverted from science into an engineering discipline I feel compelled to point out that scientists don't dwell in ivory towers. The majority of scientists are extremely practical people because practicality goes with the subject. We have to make and service our own equipment, become expert in delicate manipulation of objects. For example could you remove the nucleus from a cell without damaging the cell in the process? How about a simple every-day task - could you weigh out milligrams of a potent toxin without killing yourself and everyone else in the room?

      Detached from the world? Don't we have partners, children, social lives, homes to run? Are we not exposed to more of that nasty world than you will ever see since we exist on very low income and (some of us) are involved in work that examines the seedier side of human existence? Forensic examination of paedophile cases, murders, financial crime, pathology all done by scientists from multiple disciplines not just by specialist investigators. Many involved in examining serious crimes that span national borders, use of nerve agents, improvised explosives, the general inhumanity of mankind on a large scale. Scientists do all that and more. There are very few scientists who don't have the real world rubbed into their faces on a daily basis.

      1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
        Facepalm

        Re: Lotaresco Re: Scientists - just too "ethical"?

        "....The majority of scientists are extremely practical people because practicality goes with the subject.....we have to make and service our own equipment....." I'm sure they are practical people, indeed I have worked with many that have overcome the limitations of their institutions' IT departments by simply learning how to manage their own IT gear (including one young gent with two degrees who "learnt" Linux in a fortnight!). But I don't recall many of them building their own mainframes. I have also met many senior scientists and lecturers that considered any such efforts beneath them, including one prof who refused to even use a PC and had one of his students type up all his reports, papers and even email! Despite your experience, I would suggest not all scientists are cut from the same cloth.

        "....could you remove the nucleus from a cell....." I do remember something about the theory of doing so from back in secondary school biology. Of course, if I want basic lab work done I'd hire a lab assistant. But when you guys need someone to design out datacenter halls and populate them with the software, systems, networking and storage required to help you map out the human genome, calculate the number of asteroids in the Kuiper belt, or just keep the records on all those criminals you mentioned, I'm much more likely to get the call than you, thanks. And if they need someone to actually talk to the business side of the institutions and explain how they can share resources, re-use investment and break projects down into smaller commitments to get under budgeting thresholds then I've already been there, whilst you were presumably busy with your nuclei and millingrams of toxin.

        1. Lotaresco
          FAIL

          Re: Lotaresco Scientists - just too "ethical"?

          " I don't recall many of them building their own mainframes."

          Not only did scientists at my alma mater build their own mainframes but ICL stole the designs and sold them. IBM incorporated the designs into their 701 and 702. There are the hypercubes built at MIT and the university of Michigan. The dedicated VR system built at the University of Loughborough. The cellular processor arrays built by the University of Manchester. In short you're wrong. scientists built mainframes, subsystems, processors, arrays - the entire gamut of computing devices.

          " I would suggest not all scientists are cut from the same cloth."

          <gasp> You suddenly realise that scientists are as diverse as the general population. Well that's a move forward from your assertion that they live in ivory towers.

          ""....could you remove the nucleus from a cell....." I do remember something about the theory of doing so from back in secondary school biology. Of course, if I want basic lab work done I'd hire a lab assistant."

          So that would be a "no" from you then. Also a bit of sign that you haven't had any direct experience of university level science. Academics are, with very few exceptions, hands on. Because doing the science is as important as understanding the theoretical basis of the science.

          "But when you guys need someone to design out datacenter halls and populate them with the software, systems, networking and storage required to help you map out the human genome, calculate the number of asteroids in the Kuiper belt, or just keep the records on all those criminals you mentioned, I'm much more likely to get the call than you, thanks."

          Your arrogance is amusing and also misplaced. I'm currently designing the 15th data centre of my career to-date . I'm currently considered to be one of the two best architects in my field. I turn down work on a daily basis. I'm reasonably confident that if one of the major consultancies wants someone to design a data centre that I'm up with a higher chance of being called to do the work than someone who cant even spell data centre.

          I guess in your haste to pour scorn on someone you missed the first sentence of the second paragraph of my reply to your post: "As an (ex) scientist close to retirement and diverted from science into an engineering discipline."

          BTW, I can calculate the number of asteroids in the Kuiper belt for you now if you're interested <frowns><concentrates> It's zero (0). The Kuiper belt contains Kuiper belt objects or generically trans-Neptunian objects. Asteroids are located in the <wait for it><wait for it><roll of drums> ... asteroid belt.

          1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
            Facepalm

            Re: Lotaresco Re: Lotaresco Scientists - just too "ethical"?

            "....There are the hypercubes built at MIT and the university of Michigan....." Looks like your field is not in geography - Michigan is not in the EU and would not be receiving EU grants.

            "......The dedicated VR system built at the University of Loughborough. The cellular processor arrays built by the University of Manchester...." So, out of all the hundreds, if not thousands, of institutions that might receive grants from the EU, you managed two, Loughborough and Manchester. It would seem statistical analysis was also not part of your speciality.

            ".....scientists built mainframes, subsystems, processors...." No. A small subset of scientists in engineering disciplines build prototypes of next generation IT gear. The vast majority of IT in commercial and educational institutions is designed and built from COTS kit and installed by technicians, and the people ordering and that kit and services are part of the administration and usually not scientists.

            "....a bit of a sign that you haven't had any direct experience...." I never claimed to be a lab assistant, I simply explained how I have had plenty of dealings with those spending the research funds the article mentions. Or do you want to pretend all scientists in all fields have to extract a nucleus from a cell before they get a grant? Really? What, scientists doing research in geology, climate science, mathematics, polymers, they all do exactly what you do? Yeah, right! Try again. The one thing the majority of researchers will have in common is a requirement for IT, and they will usually not be specifying it themselves but going to the administration for it. I suppose next you'll try and claim they all build the buildings their labs and offices are in?

            ".......15th....." Apart from the fact that I'm waaaaay beyond that number, you yourself admitted you left science to enter the IT/engineering field and are part of the non-scientific administrations that actually make the decisions on how the majority of research funds are spent! LMAO!

            1. Lotaresco

              Re: Lotaresco Lotaresco Scientists - just too "ethical"?

              Logic doesn't appear to be your thing. Your claim was that scientists don't build mainframes. You were wrong. I cite examples of scientists building mainframes. You cherry-pick your reply and make the (irrelevant) comment about MIT and Michigan and EU grants. Your comment was *not* that EU scientists don't build mainframes it was that scientists don't build mainframes.

              I gave four examples, one would have been sufficient to prove that you don't know what you are talking about. Four left you flopping like a gaffed mullet.

              I gave example of practical skills that scientists acquire and practice to counter your stupid "ivory tower" comment. I have not claimed that all scientists do the same thing. I have stated that scientists do practical things that you would find difficult or, I suspect, impossible to do. Geologists? They operate drilling rigs have you done much of that? Physicists? For one of the projects that I worked on the physicists designed and constructed and QA'd the detector vacuum tubes used in the assembly in a six-sigma process. Yet according to you, they are "ivory tower" scientists incapable of functioning in a commercial environment. Why not just come clean and admit either that you don't understand the meaning of "ivory tower" or that you don't have a clue about the practicalities of research and the closest that you have been to a research institute is to stare at one from across the street?

              Your comment about how IT is purchased makes it clear that you've had no experience of providing IT within an academic environment. Your (repeated) comment about "lab assistant" is proof that you don't understand how research is done. Even though it has been explained to you.

              "Apart from the fact that I'm waaaaay beyond that number" yes, yes, of course you are dear. There there. I mean building more than one DC a year is just so common... <yawn> BTW, screwing a door onto a 19" rack following the instructions from an grown-up isn't "building a DC" HTH.

              "admitted"

              No, stated.

              Yes I left research work, I'm actually part of the scientific administration for EU-wide projects not the non-scientific administration.

              You OTOH are coming over as someone with a massive chip on his shoulder.

              1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                FAIL

                Re: Lotaresco Lotaresco Scientists - just too "ethical"?

                "Logic doesn't appear to be your thing. Your claim was that scientists don't build mainframes. You were wrong. I cite examples of scientists building mainframes. You cherry-pick your reply and make the (irrelevant) comment about MIT and Michigan and EU grants. Your comment was *not* that EU scientists don't build mainframes it was that scientists don't build mainframes....." It was you that stated scientists are "practical" and built their own kit, to which I responded by showing that they didn't always, and especially not when it comes to IT. Your three examples are not the norm, therefore you did not prove your point, I proved mine. You may have a problem following that logic but I'm sure the rest of the readers will not. It would seem your "science" is along the lines of simply repeating what you believe loudly and long enough in the hope it will overturn logic and evidence.

                "......Geologists? They operate drilling rigs......" I've worked with geologists (including a very interesting project for a 3D mapping tool for underwater exploration - lots of COTS image-processing servers and storage, no drilling rigs though) and they would be most upset by your denigrating them as just "operating drilling rigs". By the sounds of it, it is you that knows very little about what other scientists outside your field actually do. Indeed, you're merely reinforcing the whole "ivory tower" line with your blinkered ranting.

                "....You OTOH are coming over as someone with a massive chip on his shoulder." LOL, it is more that you seem to arrogantly believe only you have the right to comment on scientific research budgets - yeah, you did pause between rants to remember that's what the article is about, right? Apparently not.

                1. Lotaresco
                  Coat

                  Re: Lotaresco Lotaresco Scientists - just too "ethical"?

                  Another tilting at windmills session there, Mr Bryant. I didn't claim that Geologists only operate drilling rigs. It's another example of heavy industrial work that requires real practical skills that is undertaken by scientists. I'm still laughing at your desperate attempts to paint other people's comments in a bad light - not just me - it seems that it's your only form of argument. I'm also laughing at you because I took a minor in Geology as part of my degree so yes I know "quite a bit" about Geology and have taken many field trips, operated core drills, bashed bits of rocks with hammers and have prepared rock specimens for microscopy. All good practical skills and nothing to do with "ivory towers".

                  I suspect that you don't actually understand the term "ivory tower".

                  an impractical often escapist attitude marked by aloof lack of concern with or interest in practical matters or urgent problems

                  Scientists, the vast majority of them, are neither aloof nor unconcerned with practical matters or urgent problems. Their field of study involves a high level of practicality and, of course, they are people often with families all facing the struggle of living on relatively low income. How can they not know about the problems faced by the majority of the population?

                  I doubt that you'll be able to formulate a rational response to this post, and given that talking to you on this (or I suspect any) subject is banging one's head on a brick wall I'll ignore your replies from now on.

                  Bye.

                  1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                    FAIL

                    Re: Lotaresco Lotaresco Scientists - just too "ethical"?

                    "Another tilting at windmills session there...." So, another session where you will be unable to respond to anything I posted with any actual facts, then? Well, at least you're consistent in your failure.

                    ".... I didn't claim that Geologists only operate drilling rigs....." LOL, it's too funny that you're so set on denial you're even denying your own posts now! You're exact words were ".....Geologists? They operate drilling rigs....", which would seem a pretty limiting definition of the work geologists do. For a start, some geologists are involved with NASA studies of other planets, such as Mars. Somehow I can't quite see NASA employing them to "operate drilling rigs" alone. Indeed, in my experience (from working with Schlumberger and BP), the role of operating a drilling rig is done by a drilling crew, overseen by a drilling foreman and drilling manager, though they often also employ cementers, mud loggers (quite often geologists) and even divers for offshore rigs. Maybe you're ivory tower is really an ivory silo?

                    "....I know "quite a bit" about Geology and have taken many field trips, operated core drills, bashed bits of rocks with hammers and have prepared rock specimens for microscopy. All good practical skills...." Gosh, what a sudden return of memory! Of course, I have to ask, were you so "practical" that you made your own core drills, hammers and microscopes, or did some administrator buy them for you out of a budget? No, readers, I'm not offering a prize for the first one to correctly guess the answer, or how long it will take Lotaresco to remember that "memory".

                    "....I suspect that you don't actually understand the term "ivory tower"....." LOL, so you've lost the argument, now you want to split hairs over the definition of "ivory tower"!?!?!? You do remember that the article is about budgeting for UK science and the possible loss of grants from the ERC due to Brexit, not how much your ego has been bruised? It seems that, during your training to be a scientist, you skipped the class on being concise and on topic (possibly you took How Not To Be Aloof 101 instead?).

                    "....I doubt that you'll be able to formulate a rational response to this post...." Well, it is hard to formulate a response to an argument that has no facts, points nor anything actually related to the topic of the thread.

                    ".... I'll ignore your replies from now on...." And there's the inevitable retreat to your ivory silo! ROFLMAO!

    3. TVU Silver badge

      Re: Scientists - just too "ethical"?

      "A lot of the scaremongering expressed in this thread revolves around the idea bitter EUers will use the uncertainty of Brexit to chop British scientists out of long-term projects. They probably will, they may not, but I've always been taught to quit moaning about the issue and start looking for a solution. I'm guessing that the ivory-tower-dwelling scientific community are simply too detached from the nasty, devious World that consultants live in not to be prepared for this, but it looks like time to introduce you to incremental selling."

      You do not seem to be capable of actually recognising the actual and real damage that will be done not only to pure science in Britain but also to British high-tech companies because European Research Council funds also go these companies too to help keep ahead of world competition and that funding will now cease and the monies will instead now help firms in France, Germany and Italy.

      1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
        Facepalm

        Re: TVU Re: Scientists - just too "ethical"?

        "...the real damage that will be done... because Europeam Research Council funds...." Possibly. Firstly, the ERC's budget is 13bn Euros for 2014 to 2020, which is about 2.1bn-per-year. That comes out of the EU pot - remove the UK funding into that general pot, which is what will happen with Brexit, and that pot is going to be a lot smaller, threatening ERC funding after 2020. Then, add in the fact the UK will also not be paying into the general EU pot for future Euro tantrums (like the next Greek bailout and the looming Italian banking disaster), which means the ERC funding could be cut in the next EU kerfuffle before we even get to 2020. So, all those EU countries you mentioned are facing a definite future funding cut with Brexit, plus a likely further cut due to the precarious economic state of the EU.

        Secondly, given that the UK has historically received about 8% of ERC funds, that means if the UK lost all future ERC funding it would be about 160m Euros per year lost. Meanwhile, the funds the UK would have paid into the ERC pot can go to funding British science directly, being added to the 3bn quid per year (already larger than the ERC annual budget) handed out by the RCUK. Please note, the ERC funding did not guarantee even one Euro being spent in the UK, whereas the RCUK spends it all in the UK.

        But, the real kicker that everyone is glossing over in their wailing is that the ERC also gives grants to non-EU institutions, which means UK scientists can still apply outside the EU.

        1. Richard 12 Silver badge

          Re: TVU Scientists - just too "ethical"?

          Matt, in your own comments you have spent the entire UK contribution to the EU at least five times before I lost count.

          There is no magical money tree.

          Also, your own future probably does not exist any more as EU data protection rules currently require that all EU data is stored in the EU, so watch all those data centres you apparently build vanish.

          The US "Safe Harbor" agreement took a long time to negotiate and turned out to be tosh, do you really think that a UK Safe Harbour could be done in under two years?

          Along with the other negotiations with the EU and rest of the world, when we don't even have a professional negotiation team any more?

          1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
            Facepalm

            Re: Richard 12 Re: TVU Scientists - just too "ethical"?

            "....you have spent the entire UK contribution to the EU at least five times before I lost count...." Or, another conclusion could be that the ERC funding, whilst nice and useful, is not the sole nor even the largest contributor to UK science funds.

            "....your own future probably does not exist any more as EU data protection rules currently require that all data is stored in the EU....." Firstly, not all UK research data (let alone UK commercial data) contains EU-related information, so that market is not going to disappear. Secondly, there is this big thing called "The Rest Of The World" which resides outside the EU. The UK actually does more trade with TROTW than the EU and a lot of scientific research with institutes outside the EU. All in all, I expect to be kept quite busy, thanks. Of the current projects I am working on, not one is affected by the Brexit.

            "......when we don't even have a professional negotiation team any more?" Says who? Apart from the fact that UK civil servants negotiate with TROTW countries regularly, you seem to have missed the fact that EU negotiations were conducted by politicians and civil servants from EU member states, including the UK. Please try using a source other than Remain propaganda.

            1. Richard 12 Silver badge

              Re: Richard 12 TVU Scientists - just too "ethical"?

              Theno please point to the negotiators we have.

              Name five.

              1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                FAIL

                Re: Richard 12 Re: Richard 12 TVU Scientists - just too "ethical"?

                "Theno (sic) please point to the negotiators we have...." It's called Her Majesty's Civil Service, especially Her majesty's Diplomatic Service, go look them up. For those big foreign deals that encompass security it's under the Foreign & Commonwealth Office, for general trade it would be the Department of International Trade, and for science in particular it could also be included in the work of the new Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy. If you'd left your ivory tower once in a while you might have noticed they have a lot of civil servants working all over the World on promoting British trade and science.

                1. Richard 12 Silver badge

                  Re: Richard 12 Richard 12 TVU Scientists - just too "ethical"?

                  And no negotiators, because the EEC/EU did all that collectively since the 1970s - it's in the treaty.

                  As these departments have already said, several times.

                  Clearly you are very happy in your dream world and do not care how small its intersection with reality is.

                  I wish you good day, and hope you do not go bankrupt because that would hurt your suppliers.

                  1. Matt Bryant Silver badge
                    FAIL

                    Re: Richard 12 Richard 12 TVU Scientists - just too "ethical"?

                    "And no negotiators, because the EEC/EU did all that collectively since the 1970s...." LOL, are you in the same underground ivory silo as Lotaresco? OK, let's pretend the individual EU states don't get involved in trade negotiations like this one (http://www.reuters.com/article/us-italy-china-investment-idUSKCN0I32EB20141014) if it makes you happy. So, when the PM recently entertained the Chinese Prez, you really think there was no "chats" on trade, or the new Chinese-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-31864877 - big clue - the latter is being negotiated by Her Maj's civil servants)? I'm also amused by your unquestioning faith in the EU member states blindly following EU trade rules when the EU doesn't even enforce it's own core economic rules (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/eu-backs-no-fine-for-spain-portugal-over-deficit-2016-07-28). Not that EU founder countries breaking their own rules whenever it suits them is unusual (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/eu/11207721/Why-do-France-and-Germany-keep-breaking-EU-rules.html). Oh, and the economic issues dogging Spain and Portugal are another reason we're probably better out of the EU.

                    And when HMG was negotiating a new military training scheme with the Kenyans (http://www.kenyalondonnews.org/?p=9444), do you really think they got the EU to do the negotiating for them? Sorry if your perspective is limited to the EU only, but the fact is British civil servants conduct negotiations on a daily basis with plenty of countries outside the EU.

                    Please, before you try another post, try broadening your reading sources and at least go try for a modicum of research first, mmmmkey?

  20. You aint sin me, roit
    Trollface

    Don't worry, we now have £350m a week to fund research!

    What do you mean it's not £350m a week?

    And it's already spent on the NHS?

    And ear-marked for farmers' subsidies?

    And needed to fund deprived areas?

    Oh well, we can pay for it with tax on all the profits that are rolling into ARM...

  21. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

    Anecdotal evidence is not very impressive - surely Britain's academic community can formulate hypotheses, come up with some reasonable tests and arrive at statistically valid conclusions? If not, then maybe they should not be receiving funding from the EU or anybody else for that matter.

    Another issue is whether the EU gravy train really produces worthwhile research. I can think of one case here in Spain involving €27 million of EU cash being doled out to San Sebastian City Council and ESADE Business School to do a study on the feasibility of introducing community heating systems and electric buses in municipalities. There is no doubt in my mind that such research is an utter waste of time and taxpayers' money. New York has had community heating since the early 20th Century and Vilnius (Lithuania) has a superb system of old but highly functional trolleybuses. Do we really need €27 m to re-invent the wheel?

    The third point is that if there is discrimination, Britain could simply withhold the missing funds and begin distributing the money to British research establishments in a rational and accountable way - or is that precisely what UK universities fear most?

    1. Lotaresco
      FAIL

      Re: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

      "Anecdotal evidence is not very impressive"

      Oh the irony that you then trot out anecdotes as justification for why the EU should not fund a research programme.

  22. TVU Silver badge

    He's back!

    Very regrettably, I have to report that the total intellectual inadequate that is Jo Johnson has been reappointed as Minister for Science. That is a great shame since all he seems capable of is damaging British science.

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