YERUN (Young European Research Universities Network) has published its response to the Call for Evidence for the forthcoming ERA Act which closed on 10 September 2025.
In response to the call for evidence launched by the European Commission (EC) on 6 August, we outline concrete policy areas where the ERA Act can and should make a difference.
Policy Priorities and Recommendations for the ERA Act
1. Unlocking the Fifth Freedom with Binding Commitments
- Ensure the free movement of knowledge, researchers and technology as a legally binding objective of the EU.
- Reduce national fragmentation through a more streamlined mutual recognition of qualifications, aligned funding rules, and interoperable infrastructures.
- Include enforceable provisions for Member States (MS) to progressively meet the 3% GDP target for R&D investment and continue working towards incentives and mechanisms that would foster larger investments in the future.
2. Enabling Talent Circulation and Research Careers
- Promote the implementation of the recommendations included in the EU framework for research careers, ensuring opportunities for research institutions to implement the measures and adequate collaboration and coordination between institutions of different sectors across Europe.
- Establish an EU Researcher Visa for third-country nationals with accelerated processing and multi-country mobility rights.
- Streamline social security provisions and reduce administrative burden for short-term exchanges.
- Improve recognition of prior experience (including outside academia) and remove indirect employment barriers to non-national researchers (e.g., language requirements).
- Align institutional evaluation systems with CoARA principles to recognise diverse outputs.
- Propose a minimum-standard contract template for researchers (working in academia and research institutions), adaptable to national contexts, but ensuring a minimum standard level of protection and conditions.
3. Advancing Open Science and Research Infrastructures
- Ensure that open science mandates are backed by predictable, long-term funding and technical and implementation support. Open Science policies are widely available at institutions. What often lacks are the resources dedicated to their implementation and a more thorough focus on FAIR data progress.
- Promote diamond open access models, shared repositories and network-level publishing platforms.
- Strengthen the ERIC instrument and ESFRI coordination, including for medium-scale infrastructures.
- Improve GDPR guidance for research with human data and promote national templates for Data Transfer Agreements.
4. Protecting Scientific Freedom and Institutional Autonomy
Academic freedom is a cornerstone of the ERA and a prerequisite for excellence, trust and innovation in research. YERUN welcomes the ERA Act as an opportunity to elevate the protection of scientific freedom from principle to practice. The Act should embed this value legally across MS, drawing on best practices such as constitutional guarantees (e.g. Germany, Spain) and integrating academic freedom as a structural enabler of Europe’s knowledge system.