Very sad to hear this - particularly for those who are so close to qualifying. No time for cutbacks is a good time, and given it's difficult enough to get the throughout of pilots right for future requirements, a drop in defence spending is always going to have a critical effect.
Given the government was taken to a Judicial Review over the arbitrary cancellation of schools building programmes, without taking into account the proximity of completion of some schools, cannot the RAeS do the same to at least allow those near training completion to finish their courses ?
It may save a few, but given we have way more Brigadiers than we need, and more Admirals we can shake a baton at, this reduction in pilots was inevitable. As aircraft numbers drop, so do pilot numbers and it's how it is managed that matters - and the one size type of decision seems illogical and therefore open to judicial review - but the RAF themselves could not instigate it.