SKA operations budget trimmed

The Square Kilometre Array’s operations budget will be cut by £400,000 in 2016, unless new members can bring in extra cash, according to director-general Philip Diamond.

In an interview with Research Fortnight after the SKA’s 19th meeting of the board of directors, which took place in November, Diamond confirmed that the constraint would only apply to operations at the SKA headquarters at Jodrell Bank. The £7.2-million operations budget will be trimmed by around 5 per cent. The construction budget will not be affected in any way, he says.

“We’re looking at a £400,000 constraint in 2016,” says Diamond, adding that, as this is a small percentage of the office’s operations budget it is “not a big deal” and will not affect any of the 50 staff in central office. “We’ll just have to be a little more restrained with our operational budget, travel, paperclips things like that,” he says.