UK mathematical sciences need their missing millions

In the mathematical sciences, the unexpected and impactful results are often yielded by the work away from the frontline, the less heralded research and thinking.

It seems that’s true of politics, too. It was not in the bear pit of the House of Commons chamber but at a select committee hearing in a side room of Westminster that the science minister George Freeman let slip that hundreds of millions of pounds of maths funding is at risk.

Science and Technology Committee chairman Greg Clark – himself a former science minister – was admirably tenacious in his questioning of both the minister and Dame Ottoline Leyser, chief executive of UK Research and Innovation. Unfortunately, their answers indicated another government u-turn may be in the offing (if it hasn’t already occurred). The maths community may be sold short yet again.

In January 2020, the government pledged £300 million of new funding to “fund experimental and imaginative mathematical sciences research by the very best global talent over the next five years”. But Dame Ottoline revealed that while £124 million has been delivered, the balance is unaccounted for. These are maths’ missing millions.

No pot of funding has been marked out for mathematical sciences and ring-fenced. And UKRI is only committed to supporting mathematical sciences by “juggling” funding from across a wide range of sources as part of “balancing funding across the whole research and innovation system”.

This is disappointing, to say the least. More than the money, which is welcome, the 2020 announcement represented an understanding at the highest levels of government that maths matters.

Events since January 2020 have clearly ravaged the government’s balance sheets. But the onset of Covid has only strengthened the case for more mathematical sciences funding. The graphs that modelled the pandemic, the cutting-edge science that generated a vaccine in short order and the logistics necessary to roll out the vaccine programme were all rooted in the mathematical sciences.

The funding announcement also appeared to be a tacit acceptance that research into mathematical sciences has been hard done by in the past. Injecting an additional £300 million would put the subject on a more even footing with the likes of engineering and ICT – both subjects that simply wouldn’t exist without foundational maths.

Focusing funding on those foundations makes sense. We need expert brains interrogating the fundamentals and applying creative new thinking to the puzzles that our greatest minds have grappled with for centuries. Only then will we discover the kinds of new approaches and new mathematics that can drive innovation across the STEM spectrum and beyond.

Maths lies behind our most exciting and urgent technological developments including artificial intelligence, driverless cars and quantum computers. But it fuels and infuses the social sciences too: providing the fundamentals behind economics such as the Nash equilibrium and game theory, as well as the use of topographical data science in urban studies.

Extra funding allows mathematical sciences to ensure the widest possible pool of talent is engaged with the subject. Maths remains the most popular subject at A Level, as it has for years now. While the pipeline inevitably narrows as you go further through the education system, too many of the mathematicians emerging at the other end look the same and studied at one of a handful of institutions.

Extra funding will open up extra opportunities to study mathematical sciences right through to postdoc level, widening access to those that currently don’t see themselves matching the model of what a mathematician looks like. We desperately need more women, people of colour and LGBTQ+ people to recognise themselves in the mathematical sciences. But if the balance of the £300 million is not delivered, it will be a betrayal of those that started years-long programmes of study, who will now be forced to scrabble for the funds that will allow them to see that work through to fruition.

One of the main drivers behind the London Mathematical Society’s decision to establish the Protect Pure Maths campaign exactly one year ago was to make the case in Parliament and with business that all maths matters.

It appears we may have to redouble our efforts. While Freeman insisted that mathematical sciences has not been deprioritised by the government in the years since 2020, the status of the extra funding – confusing at best, cancelled at worst – suggests otherwise.

Mathematical sciences matter more now than ever, whether it’s the everyday numeracy required to keep a handle on price rises and household budgets, or the high-level algorithms, calculations and equations that will unlock the next great innovation that improves everyone’s lives. The government ought to recognise that and provide the funding to demonstrate its commitment to this most foundational of subjects.

Ulrike Tillmann is professor of mathematics at the University of Oxford, president of the London Mathematical Society and spokesperson for the Protect Pure Maths campaign.