Photo Shutterstock Most of the planned cutbacks in education and research will continue as planned, the deal reached on the OCW budget last night reveals. Less than 700 million out of the two billion in budget cuts are reversed.
The slow student fine is off the table, and the cuts for international students in thinly populated areas are mitigated, but the austerity measures for science remain almost unchanged. Although the details are still to be divulged, efforts to keep starter grants for young scientists intact are said to have been only partially successful. The cuts will probably be reduced by 40 million euros.
In total, the cuts are to be reduced by 748 million, but part of this sum is to be covered by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (OCW). The budget for student public transport products will be reduced by 75 million euros. This reduction is not earmarked for education, which means the total reduction in austerity measures amounts to 673 million. The required funds are removed elsewhere. From the Ministry of Public Health, Welfare and Sports, for example. Medical specialists will have to contribute more for refresher training. However, universities argue that this, too, is education.
Biggest loser
Science is the biggest loser in this deal, according to the association of universities UNL. The budget for research and tertiary education will still be slashed by half a billion. ‘That is particularly harmful to the future of the Netherlands’, says UNL chair Caspar van den Berg, ‘knowledge is our key resource. However, the fact that the slow student fine has been taken off the table benefits our students.’
Student union LSVb is delighted that ‘the ridiculous slow student fine’ has been retracted but denounces the rest of the austerity measures. ‘This will not be a calm spring for the cabinet’, says chair Abdelkader Karbache. He predicts strikes.
