European Partnership for Researchers: the Spanish approach

1. European Partnership for Researchers: the Spanish approach Dra. Angeles Rodríguez Peña Deputy Director General for European Programmes Ministry for Science and Innovation

2. A European Partnership for Researchers: Key areas Open recruitment and portability of grants Attractive employment and working conditions Social Security and Supplementary Pension rights Training, skills and experience

3. A European Partnership for Researchers: Key areas Open recruitment and portability of grants Attractive employment and working conditions Social Security and Supplementary Pension rights Training, skills and experience

4. Open recruitment and portability: main obstacles • Limited autonomy in hiring by public research institutions • “Internal” recruitment in public sector. • Specific mobility funding is still limited. Mobility is the desired outcome, portability is a means to that end, but…financial legal and organisational obstacles claim for joint action!

5. Open recruitment and portability: possible actions • Giving institutions greater autonomy in hiring and adopting best practice on the recognition of qualifications. • Ensuring that all public positions are openly advertised online and improve practical support for mobile researchers. • Allowing portability of individual research grants by national funding agencies and relevant Community programmes.

6. Open recruitment: the Spanish approach National and Regional Programmes Both open to applications from foreign researchers (even no residents). Regional Programmes targeted to a particular region (Catalonia, Basque Country) Regional Programmes: ICREA (Catalonia) Ikerbasque (Basque Country) others (Andalusia, Galizia, Aragón) National Programmes: Ramón y Cajal Juan de la Cierva Torres Quevedo (to work in the private sector) JAE doc

7. Open recruitment: the Spanish case

8. Open recruitment: the Spanish case * coming from outside Spain (20% foreing + 25% nationals)

9. Open recruitment: the Spanish case Spanish performance at ERC calls 92% of the StG holders were either RyC or ICREA researchers 28% of the StG holders were non-nationals 77% of the AdG holders were either ICREA or RyC researchers 38% of the AdG holders were non-nationals

10. A European Partnership for Researchers: Key areas Attractive employment and working conditions Open recruitment and portability of grants Social Security and Supplementary Pension rights Training, skills and experience

11. Social security & Supplementary pension rights Why to address researchers? Are they a special category of workers? No, but problems normally faced by other mobile workers can become more serious for researchers: • the high-mobile nature of research activities; • researchers often hold short/medium term contracts of different nature (i.e. employee, fellow, self-employed) that may not fit in general national social security co-ordination rules.

12. Social security & Supplementary pension rights: actions Ensure that researchers and their employers have access to targeted information. Better utilisation of existing legal framework. Including rules to facilitate international mobility of researchers when concluding bilateral and multilateral social security agreements with third countries. Facilitating the transfer of supplementary pension rights for highly-mobile workers, including researchers. Encouraging pan-EU pension schemes targeted at researchers.

13. Social Security and Supplementary Pensions right: Spain • Early Stage Researchers are covered with minimum social security during their first 2 years. After this training period, all researchers have a work contract with full social security coverage. • Suplementary pensions are subject to private law. In this respect a top (COM)-down(EU27) approach will be more effective. Spain is looking forward to the results of the ongoing study "Feasability study of a pan-European pension fund for EU researchers" that will be finished by April 2010.

14. A European Partnership for Researchers: Key areas Open recruitment and portability of grants Attractive employment and working conditions Social Security and Supplementary Pension rights Training, skills and experience

15. Working conditions Complex scenario: EU and national labour law frameworks. Problems relate to the low level of salaries, to availability of financial resources, but also to how such resources are allocated, in particular, how academic performance is rewarded. • How to best balance stability of employment with flexibility deemed necessary in research? • How to best reconciling professional and private/family life?

16. Working conditions: possible actions Improving the career development opportunities for early-stage researchers by moving towards "flexicurity principles", regular evaluation, wider autonomy and better training; Research funders to take career development into account when evaluating research proposals; Introducing more flexibility in contractual and administrative arrangements and relevant national legislation for senior and end-of career researchers. Ensuring that all publicly funded researchers are covered by an adequate social security coverage. Achieving adequate gender representation in selection and funding bodies and adopting policies that enable both men and women to pursue a scientific career.

17. Working conditions: Spain Statute for early stage researchers Stipend (2 years) - minimum social security coverage Working contract(2 years) Full social security coverage Experienced researchers (PhD holders) Working contract(2 years) Full social security coverage

18. Spain: structured research career Doctoral Thesis Researcher Sufficiency Title 10 years 3 years Programme I3 (2005) Modification of the Unversity Regulation Law (2007) Ramón y Cajal Juan de la Cierva 4 years Pregrado stipend / contracts (EPIF) Technical Support Torres Quevedo Public Employment Tenders at Public Researcher Organisms Institution Contracts of R&D

19. Spain: The New Law of Science

20. A European Partnership for Researchers: Key areas Open recruitment and portability of grants Attractive employment and working conditions Social Security and Supplementary Pension rights Training, skills and experience

21. Training, skills and experience Not only entail skills for the private sector or interaction between academia and business, but also to better respond to the evolving academic world, with rising emphasis on multi- and interdisciplinary research, competitive funding and international collaboration (Bologna, FP7 PEOPLE, Joint-doctorates in ERASMUS, EIT). National skills agendas:  • To ensure that researchers are equipped with the necessary skills. • Developed in close collaboration with stakeholders in both public and private sector and with input of researchers themselves.

22. Training, skills and experience: Possible actions Amelioration of the training environment requires to ensure better links between academia and industry, e.g. by: • Support the combination of doctoral training and industry experience by the recognition of such training periods in academia (involvement of industry in curriculum development) • Promoting PhDs programmes cofunded by industry • Facilitate intersectoral mobility

23. Training, skills and experience: Spain • No national initiatives so far: training programmes are designed by each University • The new Spanish Law for Science will reinforce the intersectoral mobility, allowing temporary leaves from the public into the private sector.