"Catastrophic Reduction" - Australia Slashes Science Funding; "Climate Will Be All Gone, Basically"
Fears that some of Australia's most important climate research institutions will be gutted under a Turnbull government have been realised with deep job cuts for scientists. Fairfax Media has learnt that as many as 110 positions in the Oceans and Atmosphere division will go, with a similarly sharp reduction in the Land and Water division.
Total job cuts would be about 350 staff over two years, the CSIRO confirmed in an email to staff, with the Data61 and Manufacturing divisions also hit. The cuts were flagged in November, just a week before the Paris climate summit began, with key divisions told to prepare lists of job cuts or to find new ways to raise revenue. "Climate will be all gone, basically," one senior scientist said before the announcement. In the email sent out to staff on Thursday morning, CSIRO's chief executive Larry Marshall indicated that, since climate change had been established, further work in the area would be a reduced priority.
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Andy Pitman, director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science at the University of NSW, said the scale of the cuts was "jaw-droppingly shocking". "It's a catastrophic reduction in our capacity to assess present and future climate change," Professor Pitman said. "It will leave us vulnerable to future climate change and unable to take advantage of any positives that result."
The impact will extend not just to the science being conducted in and around Australia but also to the ability of the country to retain and attract scientists, he said. "They will focus on North American and European problems [when they go], not Australia's," Professor Pitman said.
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http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/climate-will-be-all-gone-as-csiro-swings-jobs-axe-scientists-say-20160203-gml7jy.html
