Half a billion złoty for scientists has been frozen for eight months due to government inaction.

• In November last year, Prime Minister Donald Tusk promised to donate half a billion zlotys to the National Science Centre (NCN).
• However, the agency that awards grants to scientists cannot use them because the government has not passed a law that allows it.
• Meanwhile, the National Science Centre admits that scientists believed the Prime Minister that they would finally be able to finance good projects - they sent 700 more applications to the agency than a year earlier.
• According to the center's estimates, only about 10% of applicants will receive grants in the next round. Experts believe the success rate should be three times higher.

"We have a very significant gap to make up when it comes to such centers of science and civilization as the United States and China. Europe, which, in the memory of at least some of us, was unrivaled, today has to catch up with the rest of the world, and your role in this cannot be overestimated," said Prime Minister Donald Tusk in November 2024 during a meeting with young scientists.

He also promised that the government would provide PLN 500 million in treasury bonds to the National Science Centre , an agency responsible for supporting basic research in Poland and awarding grants, including to young scientists.

This indeed happened. The agency received the bonds in December and planned to use them to finance the competitions scientists were applying for this year. As reported by the National Science Centre, researchers believed they would finally be able to implement successful projects because the agency would have an increased budget. The OPUS and PRELUDIUM competitions received 5,044 applications. This is 700 more than in 2023 and 2024 .

However, as we learned from the National Science Centre (NCN), these plans are currently hanging by a thread. Although mid-August has already passed, the NCN has still been unable to cash in the bonds. This is all due to the government's inaction. To date, no legislation has been passed to allow this.

PLN 500 million for scientists in the freezer for eight months

What's the problem? It's purely a matter of formality. For the agency to benefit from the bonds, the National Science Centre Act must be amended. Current regulations stipulate that the National Science Centre can only finance scientific research from funds transferred from the state budget in the form of targeted subsidies.

- The release of funds from treasury securities granted to the National Science Centre will be possible after the entry into force of the act amending the act on the National Science Centre - admits the press office of the Ministry of Science in an email sent to the CIS.

A critically important change was not included in the law in April, when Parliament last amended this regulation. When will it appear in the law? It's unknown.

"Currently, this bill is being processed as part of a deregulation package," officials from the Ministry of Science and Higher Education tell us. In April, Deputy Minister Karolina Zioło-Pużuk promised in an interview with WNP that the matter was a priority for her ministry .

Meanwhile, the Agency is hearing that if the law is not adopted, funding for next year's competitions will not increase.

We estimate that in such a situation, the success rate will drop to approximately 10%. This means that nearly 90% of scientists will not receive funding, even if they submit very good projects. This would be a similar result to 2022-2023, when the National Science Centre was starved," says Anna Korzekwa, spokesperson for the National Science Centre.

Fight for the National Science Centre - first a hunger strike, then bonds

Minister of Education and Science Przemysław Czarnek criticized the National Science Center (NCN) for its grant-awarding practices, including the requirement to submit applications in English, even in the humanities, and for projects to be evaluated by international reviewers. He also announced a thorough overhaul of the agency. At the same time, he blocked any real increase in its budget – between 2018 and 2023, it increased by only about 13%, which did not compensate for inflation.

Grant winners came to the agency's defense by organizing the #NCNtoTlen campaign, during which they showed the breakthroughs they had achieved thanks to state funding .

Following protests from scientists, the National Science Centre's budget for 2024 was increased by PLN 200 million in an emergency, and then by another PLN 100 million for 2025. According to researchers, this was still PLN 200 million too little to fund highly regarded projects annually.

The confusion surrounding the bonds is causing concern among researchers, as the first preparations for the 2026 budget are currently underway, which means that the fate of the agency's further funding is also at stake.

The political background of the bonds for the National Science Centre - the resignation of Dariusz Wieczorek

The November move to transfer the bonds to the National Science Centre is, on the one hand, a response to these needs. On the other, it's an attempt to calm the general situation in science. Last fall was marked by a series of failures for Dariusz Wieczorek, head of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, which ultimately led to his resignation. He was replaced by another Left-wing politician, Marcin Kulasek.

This included the removal of Piotr Sankowski, president of IDEAS NCBR, from the research infrastructure, gaps in its financing, e.g. the lack of funds for maintaining the Oceania research vessel, and finally the scandal involving the disclosure of data of a whistleblower from the University of Szczecin.

What about the NCBR reform and other promises of the Prime Minister?

In April, the Prime Minister met twice with a delegation of scientists. During the meeting, he also made a number of promises to address the challenges facing Polish science. In June, we reviewed the progress made in implementing the agreements reached at this meeting.

• The introduction of simplifications in the field of public procurement law for researchers. According to the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, the Public Procurement Office (UZP) is expected to address these issues. Currently, a working group has been established within the UZP to develop practical guidelines, including those for estimating the value of contracts.
• Introducing a fund transfer mechanism. This instrument would allow for the funding in Poland of projects that received very high ratings in the European Research Council's Horizon ERC program but ultimately failed to receive funding. The idea is to attract the best researchers to Poland who simply didn't qualify for the European budget, but whose project ideas were highly rated. In mid-June, the Ministry of Science and Higher Education informed us that it was "working on implementing this instrument in Poland."
• The issue of allocating more funds for the intermediate stage between basic research and implementation (so-called Proof of Concept) is also raised. Here, too, we heard that "the Ministry of Science and Higher Education is working." The planned programs will aim, among other things, to support low-level technologies, which are crucial and even determine whether a given innovation will be implemented as a market product.
• NCBR reform. As we've heard, the Council of Ministers is working on amending the NCBR Act. The Standing Committee of the Council of Ministers was supposed to consider the bill in May, but it was postponed until the ministries address all the concerns they have.