HUNDRED AND FIFTY-SIXTH SESSION OF COUNCIL
16 September 2010
RESTRICTED SESSION
LHC PROGRESS REPORT
The Council took note of the presentation by the Director-General and of the oral reports by the Chairman of the Scientific Policy Committee, Professor Fernandez, and the Chairman of the Finance Committee, Dr Steinacher, expressed appreciation for the continued excellent performance of the LHC machine, experiments and computing grid and for the emerging physics results and invited the Management to convey its warm congratulations to all the teams involved.
The Council took note of a further statement by the Director-General that discussions were under way, in consultation with the LHC collaborations, to assess the feasibility and desirability of increasing the LHC centre-of-mass energy from 7 TeV to 8 TeV during the present run.
ORGANISATION OF THE COUNCIL'S RESTRICTED SESSION AND EUROPEAN STRATEGY SESSION IN SEPTEMBER 2012
The Council unanimously decided that the September 2012 meetings of the Scientific Policy Committee and Finance Committee would be held at CERN, in the usual way;
that its Autumn Restricted Session would be held at a Brussels venue to be confirmed at a later date by the Belgian delegation;
that the Autumn European Strategy Session dedicated to the update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics, would also be held in Brussels at the headquarters of the European Commission;
that research ministers should be invited to attend the European Strategy Session.
AGREEMENT BETWEEN FRANCE, SWITZERLAND AND CERN RELATING TO PROTECTION AGAINST IONISING RADIATION AND THE SAFETY OF THE ORGANIZATION'S FACILITIES
The Council unanimously decided to approve the draft agreement between France, Switzerland and CERN relating to protection against ionising radiation and the Safety of the Organization's facilities.
MEDIUM TERM PLAN FOR THE PERIOD 2011-2015 AND DRAFT BUDGET OF THE ORGANIZATION FOR THE FIFTY-SEVENTH FINANCIAL YEAR 2011
The Council approved the overall strategy for 2011-2015, as set out in Chapters I and II of the Medium-Term Plan document CERN/SPC/948/Rev.-CERN/FC/5450/Rev.-CERN/2915/Rev., as well as the 2011 Draft Budget in 2010 prices as proposed in Chapter IV, on the understanding that:
- the proposals set out in the Medium-Term Plan as part of the Management's projected overall strategy aimed at restoring full funding of the Pension Fund, namely an increase in the contribution rate and an injection of additional capital into the Fund, would be subject to a subsequent Council decision,
- the provision in the Medium-Term Plan relating to the outcome of the five-yearly review was to be considered as a maximum amount and would be subject to a Council decision following completion of the statutory concertation procedure, and that any unused portion of the provision would be allocated to reducing the accumulated budget deficit.
The Council also took note of the Resources Plan for 2011 to 2015, set out in Chapter III.
Finally, the Council took note of a statement by the Director-General expressing appreciation for the constructive spirit in which the bilateral discussions with individual delegations had been conducted since the June Council Session and for the Council's positive decision at the present Session, which in the current difficult economic and financial climate reflected strong support for the Organization, its staff and the Management.