As you probably know there are currently broadly two flavors of PhD positions: AiO and bursary. While AiO are regular employees, and regarded as such by the university and the taxation office, bursaries are regarded as students by the university. Since bursaries get a grant rather than a wage, the university does not have to pay certain employer expenses, making bursary positions much cheaper than AiO positions. Of course, there are downsides to bursary positions compared to AiO positions, for instance:

- Summed up, bursaries earn less than AiOs.

- Bursaries do not have teaching duties, and are not even allowed to teach.

- Bursaries do not enjoy all secondary conditions of employment, such as a holiday bonus, retirement build-up, protection of their position by law, etc.

As you probably know as well, the labor union ABVAKABO FNV sued the RUG in name of 13 of their members, who are bursary PhDs at the RUG, demanding that they be regarded as regular employees. Friday, the judge in this lawsuit decided that bursaries are indeed performing regular labor, and should be regarded as employees. The verdict favors the point of view of ABVAKABO FNV in all three main issues of the case: what bursaries do is labour, what they earn is wage, and the relation of a bursary with his supervisor is a hierarchical one. As a result, bursaries should be recognized as employees.

What impact this will have is too early to say, and the RUG still has a chance to appeal the decision, but we will keep you informed about new developments.

More background information about the bursary system can be found at: http://www.grasp.name/content/view/38/93/

A report of the ruling is on the ABVAKABO site (Dutch): http://www.abvakabofnv.nl/cao/bericht/promovendi_rug_geen_studenten_maar_werknemers/