Science - Fight for physics at Reading
WORKERS, DEC 2006 ISSUE
As Workers went to press, pressure was building to save the physics department at Reading University. The students at Reading and the lecturers' union UCU have been fighting the proposed closure at a local and national level.
Since the proposed closure was announced Blair has said that the development of science is equally important as economic stability for future prosperity. (What "economic stability" Workers readers might ask?) He also outlined how to encourage people to take science subjects at school and university.
When Sally Hunt, joint general secretary of UCU, heard the Prime Minister's remarks, she said, "To listen to what ministers, business and academics have to say about science in this country one would assume that the future is bright.
"However, 70 science departments have been shut in the last seven years, whereas in China and India they are opening, not closing, departments. If individual vice-chancellors, like Gordon Marshall at Reading, still have the power to fly in the face of expert opinion and wield the axe then clearly the system is not working."