News & Views item - May 2007

 

 

The 2007/08 Federal Government's Science and Innovation Budget. (May 9, 2007)

    The following text is the summary assessment by Peter Pockley, senior correspondent for Australasian Science of the 2007/08 Federal Government's "major support for Science and Innovation through the budget and other appropriations".

Table 1 [of the 7 page document]  gives the game away.

Over all portfolios, there is an increase of $171.9 million in 2007-08 over the "estimated actual" for 2006-07; i.e. 2.7%, almost exactly the rate of inflation.

As for "boosts", the % Total Australian Government Expenditure is  2.83% for 2007-08, a small DECREASE on 2006-07 of 2.89% and 2005-06 of 2.84%.

In other words, the increase for CSIRO ($54.4 million in this table) has been at expense of reductions elsewhere.

Mystifyingly, given the hype about increased funding for medical research, NHMRC and Other Health expenditure drops from $911.7 million in 2006-07 to $550.7 million in 2007-08.