DÉFENDRE LA RECHERCHE FONDAMENTALE
Dear Minister,
In June 2010, CERN Council postponed the approval of the medium term plan proposed by the Management and asked for a downwards revision of these budget estimates. The CERN Staff Association condemns this policy mainly concerned with the short term and wishes to make this known.
In Lisbon in 2000, the Member States of the European Union wanted for 2010 a Europe with “the most competitive and dynamic growth economy in the world…”. To do this they decided, in particular, in Barcelona in 2003 to increase the level of national investment in R&D to 3% of their GDP in 2010.
They thus expressed their desire not to increase the gap with the United States in this domain, in order to better build the future in the face of a globalization of the economy. We know what has happened since then: they abandoned this objective even before the crisis in 2008. Today they barely manage 1.85% of GDP.
During the serious economic crises which have hit Europe since CERN’s existence - without mentioning the era in which CERN was born, an era when the founding States decided to unite efforts to create this first European laboratory – the Member States have always been committed to ensuring a future for research and putting it on a level comparable with the United States. Today they have succeeded.
The efforts of the Member States and the policy implemented at CERN to attract, motivate and retain staff of the highest competence from all Member States, have given it the level of excellence it has today. With the LHC and its experiments, the Laboratory can now offer researchers from Europe and the rest of the world the means to ensure Europe pole position in the world of particle physics.
Thanks to its established policy of transfer of knowledge, CERN also permanently offers training to hundreds of Degree and PhD students, and teachers from the Member States. Through its own development and technological transfer policy, it offers the economic and industrial world some of the most important leading technologies of the moment in various areas, such as the Web and the Grid or medical imaging, for example.
We, along with the European Physics community, want European physics to conserve the position and dynamism it has today. To do this, the Laboratory needs to have at its disposal the resources indispensable for carrying out its scientific mission. For several years severe budget restrictions have been imposed on CERN, which have reduced its resources to a minimum. To reduce them even further would irremediably compromise its functioning and, therefore, its future.
If the Member States wish to keep the position they have today in particle physics, which crowns the long years of effort, they will not impose the additional planned budget restrictions, which will ruin these efforts. We ask you, therefore, to consider this in CERN Council’s decision-making this year.
In the hope that our appeal be heard, we remain
Yours faithfully
Gianni Deroma
President of the CERN Staff Association
In June 2010, CERN Council postponed the approval of the medium term plan proposed by the Management and asked for a downwards revision of these budget estimates. The CERN Staff Association condemns this policy mainly concerned with the short term and wishes to make this known.
In Lisbon in 2000, the Member States of the European Union wanted for 2010 a Europe with “the most competitive and dynamic growth economy in the world…”. To do this they decided, in particular, in Barcelona in 2003 to increase the level of national investment in R&D to 3% of their GDP in 2010.
They thus expressed their desire not to increase the gap with the United States in this domain, in order to better build the future in the face of a globalization of the economy. We know what has happened since then: they abandoned this objective even before the crisis in 2008. Today they barely manage 1.85% of GDP.
During the serious economic crises which have hit Europe since CERN’s existence - without mentioning the era in which CERN was born, an era when the founding States decided to unite efforts to create this first European laboratory – the Member States have always been committed to ensuring a future for research and putting it on a level comparable with the United States. Today they have succeeded.
The efforts of the Member States and the policy implemented at CERN to attract, motivate and retain staff of the highest competence from all Member States, have given it the level of excellence it has today. With the LHC and its experiments, the Laboratory can now offer researchers from Europe and the rest of the world the means to ensure Europe pole position in the world of particle physics.
Thanks to its established policy of transfer of knowledge, CERN also permanently offers training to hundreds of Degree and PhD students, and teachers from the Member States. Through its own development and technological transfer policy, it offers the economic and industrial world some of the most important leading technologies of the moment in various areas, such as the Web and the Grid or medical imaging, for example.
We, along with the European Physics community, want European physics to conserve the position and dynamism it has today. To do this, the Laboratory needs to have at its disposal the resources indispensable for carrying out its scientific mission. For several years severe budget restrictions have been imposed on CERN, which have reduced its resources to a minimum. To reduce them even further would irremediably compromise its functioning and, therefore, its future.
If the Member States wish to keep the position they have today in particle physics, which crowns the long years of effort, they will not impose the additional planned budget restrictions, which will ruin these efforts. We ask you, therefore, to consider this in CERN Council’s decision-making this year.
In the hope that our appeal be heard, we remain
Yours faithfully
Gianni Deroma
President of the CERN Staff Association
