This was an option available to 1987 Scheme memebrs, when police pensions changed in 2006. 7.2 With that in mind, we are surprised to read at 2.66 in the EIA, that HM Government seems unaware that their original unlawful protections potentially kept older police officers in existing schemes until as late as 2032: –, “From 1 April 2022, when all those who continue in service will be members of reformed schemes, older members who had been offered transitional protection will have had more than 20 months notice of the government’s plans and will be able to participate in the reformed schemes in relation to any eligible employment from 1 April 2022 onwards, beyond their legacy scheme Normal Pension Age (by 1 April 2022, all members who were offered transitional protection in 2012 will have reached their Normal Pension Age).
© The Financial Times Ltd 2020 "FT", "Financial Times", "FTAdviser" and "Financial Adviser" are trademarks of The Financial Times Limited and their associated companies. Generally this will impact upon officers on the 2006 Scheme pension. These officers should receive the interest as an immediate one off payment. Financial Adviser is the premier weekly newspaper for UK based financial intermediaries.
We would suggest these are both objectively fair and logical. ( Log Out / Question 9: Does the proposal to close legacy schemes and move all active members who are not already in the reformed schemes into their respective reformed scheme from 1 April 2022 ensure equal treatment from that date onwards? The Government has conceded defeat in a huge legal battle over police pensions, acknowledging that moving police officers to new police pension schemes, based on their age, was discriminatory. They will have been paid during that time of course, but been paid for work, while being subject to all the restrictions on freedoms, and the on / off duty responsibilities and risks that come with being a serving police officer – being paid to work is very different from receiving a pension. However, once I am in an informed position to announce how these changes will potentially affect our membership, I will ensure a timely update is provided via the PSNI E-mail system and online via the PFNI Website and Twitter account. Change ), You are commenting using your Twitter account. younger officers are afforded a larger commutation factor providing a larger tax free ‘lump sum’. The withdrawal of assurances they were given, results in very short notice changes to their pension remuneration, very close to their date of retirement. 10.1 We are concerned regarding the timescales between the consultation closing in October and the Employment Tribunal considering the proposed remedy for police officer pensions in November. I can confirm that this is incorrect. These large sums are stark and suggest there may need to be further review and reform”. 3.2 We feel our Police Federations have let us down in relation to their lack of action to protect their members from unlawful and unfair pension reform, and have consistently failed to understand the nuances of police pensions and pension reform. While the discrimination we will highlight was already present, these are new proposals and we, along with others who challenged the unlawful transitional protections, could not have known how HM Government would respond to try and remedy their error. This proposed remedy (inadvertently we can only hope) essentially devalues, certainly in terms of pension remuneration, that young service and ‘wipes out’ those early financial contributions. 2.5 All the points we raise are broadly true for all uniformed services currently operating pension schemes with Normal Pension Ages (NPAs) based on service rather than age (police, firefighters and armed forces), but our response, save where otherwise specifically highlighted, relates solely to police officer pensions. 2. “However, it was left with little choice after a 2018 Court of Appeal ruling determined transitional protections given to members within 10 years of receiving their pension - negotiated as part of radical reforms to public sector pensions introduced in 2015 - constituted age discrimination. It suggested all active members be placed in the reformed schemes from April 2022. 7.5 We can only conclude that by going against the statement they made in open court, HM Government are now knowingly proposing to act immorally, to the detriment of older officers who have lost previous protections. This consultation ran from 16 July 2020 to 11:59pm on 11 October 2020 This consultation seeks views on proposals relating to the 2015 public service pension scheme reforms.
5.3 Using DIRECT COMPARATORS, that is to say officers who joined their respective pension schemes on the same day, under the same terms and conditions, the following true life scenarios highlight the crux of the issue: –. In essence, these young officers would have been no worse off, if they waited and joined the police aged 30 on the 1987 scheme and served for 30 years, or aged 25 on the 2006 scheme and served 35 years, rather than work until aged 55. Changes to judges' pensions and local government pension schemes will be consulted on separately due to changes in pension protections. Most of the reformed schemes have a Normal Pension Age (NPA) linked to the member’s State Pension age (the age at which a State Pension can be received). HM Government also expressed the view that it was ”MORALLY the right thing to do” to protect older officers and those closest to retirement, when in fact it was younger officers, with less accrued pension benefits in their existing pension schemes, who LEGALLY required greater protection.
We appreciate that heavily tapered officers were already in this bracket (paying into the 2015 CARE scheme for a very short period of time), but they had a significantly longer notice period. It was the unlawful actions of HM Government that created this situation and officers should not be worse off as a result. Yes, it is through no fault of these officers that they ‘overpaid’ (while on the 2015 CARE Scheme). A colleague aged 30 would be even better off than the 25-year-old colleague, as the CARE part of their pension would be accessible immediately on completion of 30 years service and be ‘unreduced’.). 77-79 Garnerville RoadBelfastBT4 2NXNorthern Ireland, PFNI calls for urgent review of sentencing guidelines, PFNI will do all it can to support officers in Covid-19 outbreak, Holiday Pay Tribunal Update - 5th November 2018, Reaction by PFNI Chairperson, Mark Lindsay to PSNI Overtime Bill. It concerns us greatly that none of these bodies have noticed what appears to us to be clear age discrimination and unfair treatment towards younger police officers. From 1 April 2015 a Career Average Revalued Earnings (CARE) scheme called the Police Pensions Scheme 2015 (2015. South West Region Police Pensions Board » However, were consideration required to be given to other potential solutions for negating (at least in some way) the discrimination and disadvantage suffered by younger officers, there may be scope to allow officers to CHOOSE from a range of options as follows: –.