Éditorial
Several hundred of you participated in our public meetings of 15 to 18 October 2012. Thank you for attending. During those meetings we discussed various topics. The main ones are summarized in this article. Refer to the URL: https://indico.cern.ch/conferenceDisplay.py?confId=212880 for the full presentation.
Mars 2012
This year, without additional steps, the advancement budget based on two steps per eligible staff in the career bands a, b and c, and one step in the band ECE, was fully distributed, in particular in each career path and globally in ECE, with a small transfer from career path G to E. Almost 53 % of eligible staff received two steps, a quarter received one step, a fifth received three steps, and a very few received four or more steps (Fig. 1). The development over the last 6 years (Fig. 2) shows a statistical distribution getting ever narrower and centred on the average of two steps, in particular when the advancement budget is limited by a decrease in or absence of additional steps. The number of staff receiving one step is, on the contrary, steady at about 25 % in agreement with a guideline set at the beginning of each exercise. A more detailed study also showed that the number of steps awarded decreases with the number of years at CERN; is this the orange zone of MAPS (2001−2006) which reappears?
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| Fig. 1 : Step distribution (without ineligibles) | Fig. 2 : Step distribution (2007-2012) |
The CERN pension fund and its capital preservation policy
No investment is without risk. The investment strategy of our pension fund, based on the principle of capital preservation, allocates an objective of returns to be achieved, and an upper limit to risk not to be exceeded. The implementation is done through a judicious distribution of the pension fund’s assets between different types of investments (Fig. 3). To ensure that those objectives are respected, and in particular the risk management under control, the investment process is regularly monitored by the Pension Fund Governing Board (PFGB) and its investments Committee (PFIC), in which the staff is represented. These Committees are supported by external consultants (Fig. 4).
The implementation of the capital preservation strategy has been started and should allow the objective of a return on investments that the CERN Council assigned to the PFGB to be met : 5 % (or 3 % above inflation when the latter is taken to be 2 % per year), taking the lowest possible risk at all times.
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| Fig. 3 : Strategic assets allocation | Fig. 4 : Risk and performance control |
Award of indefinite contracts (IC)
To safeguard its excellence in the numerous tasks required – basic research, technical developments and innovation, as well as the training of several hundred associates, fellows and students and the support of more than 10 000 users – CERN must implement a coherent contract policy. Figure 5 shows the evolution of various populations working at CERN during the period 2001–2011, compared to the decreasing one of IC staff. CERN must be allowed to recruit staff of the highest competence from all over Europe, and soon from other parts of the world, and then to retain and motivate them during their career. Of particular interest are training and management skills, essential functions of the Organization well-valued by the Member States. To that end, CERN needs to count on a dedicated permanent staff with an expert knowledge in the fields of accelerators, experimental setups and procedures, which can only be acquired over the long term.
A few years ago, CERN Council imposed an upper limit of 2250 total staff. Since then the Management has convinced the Member States to give them, on a temporary basis, the flexibility to transfer up to 5 % of the budget between the personnel and material budgets. Indeed, staff resources are missing to properly support the various current and future projects, and in particular to plan and complete the machine shutdown (LS1) in 2013 and 2014. Over the last three years (Fig. 6) about 150 additional staff, compared to the last two years, have been recruited mostly on an LD contract of 5 years. During the years amongst us, these colleagues have acquired an essential experience for CERN and the loss of these competences is definitely not in the interests of the Organization.
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| Fig. 5 : Evolution of populations working at CERN | Fig. 6 : Newcomers and departures at CERN |
After this additional recruitment, CERN needs to be careful not to auto-impose constraints for the granting of indefinite contracts (IC), for example a fixed number or fraction, which could result in the Organization losing up to 2/3 of staff holding a limited duration contract (LD) and therefore their experience. Any planning of the number of ICs needs to be based on a multiyear analysis of real needs that fluctuate year by year and which anticipates new projects as part of the updated European scientific strategy for particle physics together with additional financial resources from new Member States. The excellence of CERN relies in a critical way on the long-term employment of a permanent staff with highly-specialized professional expertise. We should not rush into short-term decisions but rather adopt a long-term prospective.
General information
2012 a year of excellence for CERN: well done to all
On the 4th July, CERN organized a huge event where the ATLAS and CMS experiments demonstrated strong evidence of the existence of a particle which could be the Higgs particle. On that day, we were on the front page of the international news (newspapers or television). The Organization can be proud of this achievement and the Finance Committee, in its meeting of 19th September, congratulated the staff, the Management and the users for their work over many years which allowed this remarkable success.
The cost variation index (CVI)
This is the implementation of the process described in the second part (Annual reviews) of Annex A1 of the CERN Staff Rules and Regulations.
For the stipends and basic salary, the method of calculation is based on the Geneva cost-of-living movement (−0.2 %) and on the movement of real net salaries of civil servants of the Swiss Federal Public Service (+0.8 %) and of seven Member States (−1.1 %), which gives a global calculated index for the CVI 2013 of −0.3 %. The Management proposed the Official Committees to implement an index of 0 % (same salary grids as in 2012 and 2013). The negative index of −0.3 % will be added to the number of −0.2 % of the previous year, to make −0.5 % for the year 2014.
Regarding the subsistence allowances and the family benefits, the calculation is only based on the Geneva inflation (−0.2 %). The Management proposed the Official Committees to apply an index of 0 % (no change in 2013 compared to 2012). In this case, −0.3 % is kept in memory for the exercise of 2014.
The voluntary programmes
The long-term saved leave programme (LTSLS), introduced in 2012, is an extension of the STSLS programme, launched in 2008. The long-term component had been added to respond to a high demand of the staff members, and in particular to allow staff recruited since January 2012, who need to work until the age of 67 years, to purchase up to a maximum of two years of leave to be taken just before retirement. To keep such a programme cost-neutral for the Organization, a negative interest of 0.8 % takes into account the effect of the career evolution. An annual bonus of one additional day of leave is given to the staff who participate in the programme.
On 1st October 2012, over 80 % of staff participated in the LTSLS programme. Compared to the STSLS (Fig. 7) we note a high increase of the number of participants, which demonstrates that the saved leave scheme at the end of the career corresponds to a real need. So, why would do you not buy at least one slice of 1.5 % of basic salary, which would allow you to have 5.5 days plus one day (see below), a total of 6.5 days: a bargain.
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| Fig. 7 : Number of slices taken (STSLS and LTSLS) | Fig. 8 : Participants in the PTW and PRP |
The Progressive Retirement Programme (PRP) and Part-time work as a pre-retirement measure programme seem to be less successful than in previous years (Fig. 8). This is essentially because of a demographic effect. Indeed, there are fewer staff members in the age bracket 58−64 years than ten years ago. Nevertheless, it is important to maintain these two programmes, because in a few years’ time, the staff recruited from 1st July 1987 will be in the age bracket 62−64 years (the pension of these staff are subjected to a reduction factor when they retire before the age of 65) and may be interested to have some flexibility in their working time near retirement as offered by these programmes.
New website of the Staff Association and special discount for its members
Go to the new website of the Staff Association (http://staff-association.web.cern.ch/) and discover the special discounts offered to its members. Your comments and suggestions are most welcome.
