Opposition joins Charter Science Collective against ... - The País.com (Spain)

All parliamentary groups except the PP, UPN and Foro Asturias, have joined the governing groups and scientists in defense R & D & I in front of some cuts that put Spain “in a disadvantaged situation face out of the crisis and the settlement of a knowledge-based economic model. ” So declares the document that has been signed by most of the opposition groups in a ceremony at the Congress of Deputies which was attended by representatives of the Collective Letter by Science: Spain Confederation of Scientific Societies (COSCE), the Conference Rectors of Spanish Universities (CRUE), associations of young researchers and trade unions CCOO and UGT.

“report published by the INE this November notes that spending on R & D in 2012 has fallen back and standing at 1.3% of GDP, representing a decline of one-tenth of GDP in just three years, “the document begins, and remember that 2013 will mark a further decline while the European average grows. Thus, compared to the “abandonment” of the Government, the political groups of the agreement signatories claim to recover the level of investment in R & D in 2009, removing restrictions to hire the necessary human resources in the sector, establish multi-annual expenditure commitments to promote good scientific planning smoothly and the creation of the State Agency under the law since 2011 to manage and distribute the funds Research. That is, the opposition has taken over the claims of the Charter Science.

The first sign was the secretary general of the PSOE, Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba. We have followed the coordinator of IU, Cayo Lara, Rosa (UPyD); Pedro Azpiazu (PNV), Rafael Larreina (Amaiur) Joan Tardà (ERC); Olaia Fernandez Davila (BNG), Pedro Quevedo (CC); Joan Baldoví ( Compromís-Equo). CiU has not been signed, but signs the document.

The event was attended by the winners of the Prince, Antonio García-Bellido and Amable Linan, Asturias Prize Juan Luis Arsuaga and National Research Awards Jesús Ávila, Mateo Valero, Juan Luis Vazquez and Antonio Cordoba Barba and rectors of the Autonomous University of Madrid, José María Sanz, and Complutense, José Carrillo. While Arsuaga read a text from 1934 in which Santiago Ramón y Cajal warned that Spain paid little attention to science tripping over themselves to its economy to disaster; Sanz emphasized the need for more support for R + D + I and of “a strategic and long-term planning”, because otherwise it will fall to Spain “an irrelevant position in the global context.”

also attended COSCE president, Carlos Andradas (who has read the document parliamentary engagement), President of the Forum for Innovative Enterprises, Francisco Marín, José Manuel Fernández, of the Federation of Young Researchers (FJI); Amaya Moro-Martín, the Platform for Decent Research,. Ignacio Fernández Toxo (CC OO) and Antonio Ferrer (UGT)