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HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-FORTH SESSION OF THE COUNCIL

16 March 2017

 

RESTRICTED SESSION

PRESIDENT’S REPORT

The President gave an oral report on the following matters:

- Meeting with the EC Director-General for Research and Innovation

- Gender in Physics conference

- Visit to the Wigner computing centre in Hungary

 - Documents “for feedback”

 

DIRECTOR GENERAL’S REPORT

The Director-General gave an oral report on the following matters:
 

- Progress of the Extended Year-End Technical Stop (EYETS)

- Results from the experiments at the Antiproton Decelerator (AD) facility

- India’s accession to Associate Member State status

- The newly established Office for Data Privacy Protection

- Safety and environmental protection at CERN

- “The Impact of CERN” brochure

- Protocol visits from January to March 2017

 

 

LHC MATTERS

The Council heard reports:

- by the Director for Accelerators and Technology, Dr Bordry, on the activities performed during the EYETS of the LHC and its injectors, the current cooling status of the various LHC sectors, the conclusions of the LHC performance workshop held at   the end of January 2017 and the goals for 2017, the second production year at 13 TeV.

- by the Director for Research and Computing, Professor Elsen, of a selection of recent physics results by the LHC experiments, highlights of the work conducted during the EYETS, preparations for the Phase 2 upgrades and optimisation efforts by the experiments to face the surge in computing requirements,

- by Dr Zanderighi of CERN’s Theory Department on the challenges for theory from LHC precision physics results.

 

 

STANDING ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON AUDITS (SACA)
 

 The Council heard a report by Dr Malmberg. Chair of the Standing Advisory Committee on Audits (SACA), on SACA’s 29th meeting, held on 1 March, and his presentation of SACA’s proposal for the Terms of Reference of a CERN Audit Committee, set out in document CERN/FC/6099/RA-CERN/3296/RA, and     unanimously decided:

- to approve the Terms of Reference, set out in the annex of the document, on the understanding that the new Committee would replace the Standing Advisory Committee on Audits (SACA) and that its Terms of Reference would replace those of SACA, set out in CERN/2883/Rev.2;

- to transfer the appointments of the incumbent members of SACA mutatis mutandis to the CERN Audit Committee; and

- to review the appropriateness of the Terms of Reference of the CERN Audit Committee in two years’ time.

 

ANNUAL PROGRESS REPORT FOR 2016
 

The Council took note of the Annual Progress Report of the Organization for 2016, set out in document CERN/SPC/1084/RA-CERN/FC/6096/RA-CERN/3294/RA.
 

 

INFORMATION ON THE MEDIUM-TERM PLAN FOR THE PERIOD 2018-2022

The Director-General outlined the scientific, technical and financial principles governing the preparation of the Medium-Term Plan for the period 2018-2022 as a continuation of the 2017-2021 Plan, the main pillars of the scientific strategy, and the ongoing preparatory work to secure the necessary resources for, in particular, the operation and upgrade of the LHC and implementation of the safety priorities identified. She further underlined that the Management would continue to make every effort to optimise the use of resources, identify possible savings and continue to reduce the cumulative budget deficit, assuming constant revenues from Member and Associate Member States.

 

STRATEGY AND FRAMEWORK APPLICABLE TO KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER BY CERN FOR THE BENEFIT OF MEDICAL APPLICATIONS
 

The Director for Accelerators and Technology, Dr Bordry, presented a White Paper setting out the strategy and framework applicable to knowledge transfer by CERN for the benefit of medical applications and the Council invited him to finalise the document on the basis of the delegations’ feedback and submit it for approval at the June Session.

 

“MINI” ATTRACT PROJECT

The Director for Finance and Human Resources, Dr Steinacher, presented “Mini” ATTRACT, the first phase of an initiative being promoted by CERN and other European research organisations to obtain EU funding, within the Horizon 2020 framework, for the early-stage development of detection and imaging technologies for long-term fundamental frontier research in partnership with industry, young innovators and entrepreneurs

 

 

CERN PENSION FUND

Report by the Chair of the Governing Board

The Chair of the Pension Fund Governing Board, Dr Roth, gave an oral report on the activities of the Governing Board, the Investment Committee and the Actuarial and Technical Committee since the Council’s December 2016 Session, in which he underlined, in particular, that the Fund had achieved an investment return of 1.48% in 2016 and that its cumulative return since 31.12.2011 had thus exceeded the return objective by 11 percentage points.

Deliberations on reform of the CERN pension scheme

The Council took note of document CERN/3297/RA and decided that it should revisit the possibility of modifying the CERN pension conditions for new recruits at each three-yearly periodic actuarial review, taking due account of the financial evolution of the Fund and of the Consulting Actuary’s updated projection of the cost of closing the existing scheme.

Report by the Chair of the Working Group on Pension Fund Governance

The Council heard an oral status report by the Chair of the Working Group on the Governance of the Pension Fund, Mr Pardo, on the group’s second and third meetings, in January and February 2017.

ROCEDURE FOR THE SELECTION AND APPOINTMENT OF THE STRATEGY SECRETARY FOR THE UPDATE OF THE EUROPEAN STRATEGY FOR PARTICLE PHYSICS

The Council approved the procedure set out in Section 2 of document CERN/SPC/1085-CERN/3295 for the future selection and appointment of the Strategy Secretary for the update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics, as well as the profile for the Strategy Secretary set out in Section 3 of the document.

 

CLOSED SESSION

 

ENLARGEMENT PROCESS

The Director-General reported on the status of discussions with Australia, Brazil, Canada, Croatia, Ireland, Lithuania, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation and Slovenia, and Ms Warakaulle reported on the next steps with respect to Serbia’s application to become a Member State of the Organization.

 

ANALYSIS OF APPLICATIONS RECEIVED FROM SUPREME AUDIT INSTITUTIONS
 

The Council took note of document CERN/3298/RA, containing SACA’s analysis of the applications received from three Supreme Audit Institutions for the position of future External Auditors of the Organization as of 1 January 2018.
 

ELECTIONS

The Council elected Dr B. Bowsher of the United Kingdom delegation as the Council member of the Audit Committee for three years, with immediate effect.

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