Employers may be allowed to renege on pension promises

ffacoffipawb

An article in the Sunday Telegraph has an worrying ring to it.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2006/09/24/cnpens24.xml

I did not like the bit "ministers are now said to have undergone a change of heart and to be considering the repeal of section 67 of the 1995 Pensions Act, which safeguards employees' accrued benefits, as part of its deregulation agenda."

Do I have to start worrying about my accrued final salary deferred pension rights?

Why would a government allow this if it means more people having to rely on means tested benefits if they lost their pensions?

The sooner this bunch of cretins are voted out the better.

wotsthat

The sooner this bunch of cretins are voted out the better.

The main risk to your final salary pension is that your employer goes bankrupt - I'd concentrate on making sure they aren't cretins first.

As final salary schemes have declined I wonder if the Goverment think they would be risking less votes with this measure. I don't think it will happen personally - there are much more devious ways to relieve people 'daft' enough to save for retirement that wouldn't receive half the headlines.

ManAtHome

Pensions are always a good political target - very few people notice (eg GBHs pension-grab for the last 10 years, and next who knows how many), and the 'perps' have already legged it with their (vastly improved) pensions by the time it hits the fan.

Milarky

ffacoffipawb wrote:

An article in the Sunday Telegraph has an worrying ring to it.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2006/09/24/cnpens24.xml

I did not like the bit "ministers are now said to have undergone a change of heart and to be considering the repeal of section 67 of the 1995 Pensions Act, which safeguards employees' accrued benefits, as part of its deregulation agenda."

Do I have to start worrying about my accrued final salary deferred pension rights?

Allow the possibility that this is intentional 'kite-flying' (mooting something you don't know how people will react to) in order to later:

a) withdraw this proposal

b) introduce an 'amended' proposal that takes the position back less far than this would

Remember than when you repeal something you'd have to replace it with something else. (They would have to put a cash value under any accruals taken away. Perhaps they would only allow a proportion of past accruals to be removed in this way rather than the whole?)