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quietus writes:

Bullying and harassment are just plain wrong. (Alyson Fox, director of grants, Wellcome Trust)

A top geneticist has lost her funding based on bullying allegations, reports Nature.

The top scientist, Nazneen Rahman, was accused by scientists and staff at the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR) in London of bullying behavior. Following the allegations, the ICR commissioned a law firm to carry out an independent investigation. Rather than waiting for a disciplinary hearing, Ms Rahman instead notified the ICR that she would leave after her research grant would be finished come October.

Now the UK biomedical charity which funded Ms Rahman's research has decided to act earlier, and pulled her funding. This, the Wellcome Trust claims, is in line with their new anti-bullying policy. In this, the Trust, as a first in the UK, followed the lead of the US National Science Foundation.

While the NSF's policy focused on sexual harassment, the Trust's policy takes things a bit further.

Their policy defines bullying as a misuse of power that can make people feel vulnerable, upset, humiliated, undermined or threatened. It says harassment is unwanted physical, verbal or non-verbal conduct that has the purpose or effect of violating someone else's dignity, or creating an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment for them.

It should be noted though that the Trust bases its decision on allegations without having detailed knowledge of these allegations; nor has Ms Rahman been able (or willing) to defend herself against these allegations.

The Trust states that bullying "causes significant harm, stops people achieving their full potential and stifles good research."

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