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This meeting was called to address several items: the salary survey review, a proposal made by IAEA to address the Professional salaries in Europe, cost-sharing for salary surveys in the field, and mandatory age of retirement.

On the subject of the review of the salary survey methodologies, the purpose of the meeting was to provide a briefing on the progress made to date and to seek comments and guidance from the Network. However, the ICSC secretariat presented a paper summarizing the various options under consideration and suggested that they be prioritized. FICSA expressed its surprise that the paper had not been presented first to the working group dealing with the review of the methodologies, and stated that any decision to be made about the options should be made by the working group. The HR Network agreed.

Regarding the proposal put forward by the IAEA Administration to address declining Professional staff salaries in Europe, it was noted that this was not only a European issue but also affected other duty stations. It was agreed that the ICSC should hold a workshop to look at this issue further prior to the Advisory Committee on Post Adjustment Questions (ACPAQ) meeting in Vienna in January 2009.

With regard to cost-sharing related to salary survey activities in field duty stations, it was agreed that all organizations would share the costs even if they did not have staff working in field duty stations. A minority of the organizations still had reservations about this. Concerning the mandatory age of retirement, the HR Network had been requested by the CEB to make a recommendation on this subject and include it in its programme of work for 2009. The Network decided to hire a consultant to review the issue and discussed how to fund the study.