Funds for medical research could be raided to pay for the government’s plans to reform social care in the UK, the Times reports.

Andy Burnham, the Health Secretary, told the Times that £60 million would be diverted from the health services’ research budget to fund plans to provide elderly and disabled people free care in their homes from next October.

The NHS research budget for 2010-11 is more than £1 billion. Burnham denied that cuts would compromise major research projects.

Harpal Kumar, chief executive of the medical charity Cancer Research UK, told the Times, “The NHS research and development budget funds vital infrastructure that supports cancer clinical trials. We would be very concerned to see cuts that affected these budgets given that they are an integral part of improving health outcomes for patients.”

Peter Dangerfield, co-chair of the British Medical Association’s medical academic staff committee, said the cuts could have long-term impacts on the discovery and development of new medicines. “Research, training and education budgets are usually among the first to go when the health service is asked to make savings,” he adds.

Nick Dusic, director for the Campaign for Science and Engineering, a pressure group, told the Times, “This is extremely disturbing as the NHS budget was supposed to be ring-fenced to protect long-term investment into the health needs of this country. In any department any raid on the R&D budget is supposed to be discussed first with the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser. If they’ve breached this process it’s an extremely worrying development that needs to be looked into.”