Time to start a thread on public sector pensions

Generali

FrankieBoyle wrote: »

You see, this is what I find so F*ing annoying - I only get £25K-!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Do you know that I would need a pension pot of £400k to generate an income of £25K in retirement?
Still going out on strike? Still expect the rest of us to keep you in manor you would like?

You'd need a pension pot of £400,000 to generate a £25,000 pension in year 1. You then have a life expectancy of 20 years. With inflation at 2% (target) then the ex-Civil Servant's pension will have risen to £36,000. Yours will still be £25,000, 2/3rds of his.

Desperate_Housewife_2-2

Just to put the record straight for the anti public sector brigade...

I am a staff nurse and have worked my but! off since the day I started nursing 27 years ago. My colleagues work 12 1/2 hour shifts (if they get off duty on time) and we never stop. Pay scales are http://www.nhscareers.nhs.uk/details/default.aspx?id=766 which means a newly qualified staff nurse gets £21,176 auxillaries get from band 1 up to band 3 if they are lucky. I feel lucky to work with such a decent bunch of people and would most likely do the job whatever the pay as I love it and sounds corny but it is rewarding and I can make a difference.

It is bl**dy hard work though, my whole body aches when I get home and my colleague told me the other day she couldnt get up the stairs she was so tired after her shift! I have worked in a private company and it was a doss, not like the running around we do on the wards.

I'm not moaning and I realise that pensions will take a hit as the country cant afford it, but please be aware....if you are not filthy rich then you will have to wait for operations, maybe never get that brace for your kids, you may end up looking after your elderly parents etc etc... Thank God we have the NHS is what I say, we should be thankful that we have such a marvellous system and should defend it to the end instaed of moaning about 'public sector cretins' as one unenlightened mse er posted on this thread.

Even so, I am not totally deluded, the mess this country is in with its finances means that the new pension cuts will happen. The problem is that these jobs knacker you up and it is so hard to work at this pace in your 60s, I'm in my 40s now and finding it hard.

I remember the 80s when Thatcher made a total mess of the NHS and saw the effects with my own eyes, I'm sure you wouldn't want your mother, father, loved one being cared for in a crumbling healthcare system? Don't kid yourselves out there, these cuts are going to make things worse for all of us 'regular Joes' out there, the rich wont be worrying...

We should be valuing these people who do a great job and pay them their worth. I was nursing a poor old lady a few weeks ago who apparently had bags and bags of money stashed in her house and the family were waiting for her to go so they could cop the lot, she was unconscious and laid in a hospital gown in a hospital bed but the only thing of value she had at that moment was us nurses going in to turn her, make her comfy and pain free, money is no good when you are in that way but care from public sector workers is.

vivatifosi

Generali wrote: »

Constitutionally, no Government can compel a future one to so something. Unfortunately for Central Government employees that includes paying contractually accrued pensions.

This is what concerns me Gen. As a trustee we would be dragged over the coals if we did not have sufficient money in our fund, or did not have a plan to make up the shortfall over an acceptable amount of time which isn't allowed to be excessive, and did not hold the employing company responsible for making up the amount subject to their remaining solvent. So why can the civil service plan get away with this? I'm less concerned about the local government plan because that is in better shape and don't know about the other big retirement funds (police and NHS for example).

The reality is that to get people to save for their retirement in this country, ensuring accrued benefits must remain sacrosanct. If that gets swept away then nobody will save for their pension and the impact on the social system will be terrible. It just isn't possible for the system to exist as before - in terms of civil service pensions - because demographics are changing so much and there aren't going to be the people to fund them going forward so the money has to be found from somewhere.

1jim

The_White_Horse wrote: »

these public sector cretins should all have their pensions and pay slashed by 50%.

wow, what a very helpful and enlightened post.
Please make sure you tell that to your GP and their staff when you next pop in to see them. Next time you need to be sent to hospital for tests/admission just consider the quality of staff you will be getting---a nurse with salary of £10-11K, a health care assistant on £6500.

Generali

vivatifosi wrote: »

This is what concerns me Gen. As a trustee we would be dragged over the coals if we did not have sufficient money in our fund, or did not have a plan to make up the shortfall over an acceptable amount of time which isn't allowed to be excessive, and did not hold the employing company responsible for making up the amount subject to their remaining solvent. So why can the civil service plan get away with this? I'm less concerned about the local government plan because that is in better shape and don't know about the other big retirement funds (police and NHS for example).

The reality is that to get people to save for their retirement in this country, ensuring accrued benefits must remain sacrosanct. If that gets swept away then nobody will save for their pension and the impact on the social system will be terrible. It just isn't possible for the system to exist as before - in terms of civil service pensions - because demographics are changing so much and there aren't going to be the people to fund them going forward so the money has to be found from somewhere.

What do you mean by accrued vivatifosi?

Do you mean accrued like in the pension scheme for which you are trustee or the NHS pension scheme where there are actual assets stashed away or do you mean accrued as in the Civil Service or state pension schemes where unfunded promises have been made?

My guess is that there will be a partial raid on pension schemes to make up some of the shortfall in state pension savings by changing risk rules in order to force private pension schemes to buy more Government bonds and thus lock in perpetual lenders at below market rates.

Generali

Desperate_Housewife wrote: »

Just to put the record straight for the anti public sector brigade...

I am a staff nurse and have worked my but! off since the day I started nursing 27 years ago. My colleagues work 12 1/2 hour shifts (if they get off duty on time) and we never stop. Pay scales are http://www.nhscareers.nhs.uk/details/default.aspx?id=766 which means a newly qualified staff nurse gets £21,176 auxillaries get from band 1 up to band 3 if they are lucky. I feel lucky to work with such a decent bunch of people and would most likely do the job whatever the pay as I love it and sounds corny but it is rewarding and I can make a difference.

It is bl**dy hard work though, my whole body aches when I get home and my colleague told me the other day she couldnt get up the stairs she was so tired after her shift! I have worked in a private company and it was a doss, not like the running around we do on the wards.

I'm not moaning and I realise that pensions will take a hit as the country cant afford it, but please be aware....if you are not filthy rich then you will have to wait for operations, maybe never get that brace for your kids, you may end up looking after your elderly parents etc etc... Thank God we have the NHS is what I say, we should be thankful that we have such a marvellous system and should defend it to the end instaed of moaning about 'public sector cretins' as one unenlightened mse er posted on this thread.

Even so, I am not totally deluded, the mess this country is in with its finances means that the new pension cuts will happen. The problem is that these jobs knacker you up and it is so hard to work at this pace in your 60s, I'm in my 40s now and finding it hard.

I remember the 80s when Thatcher made a total mess of the NHS and saw the effects with my own eyes, I'm sure you wouldn't want your mother, father, loved one being cared for in a crumbling healthcare system? Don't kid yourselves out there, these cuts are going to make things worse for all of us 'regular Joes' out there, the rich wont be worrying...

We should be valuing these people who do a great job and pay them their worth. I was nursing a poor old lady a few weeks ago who apparently had bags and bags of money stashed in her house and the family were waiting for her to go so they could cop the lot, she was unconscious and laid in a hospital gown in a hospital bed but the only thing of value she had at that moment was us nurses going in to turn her, make her comfy and pain free, money is no good when you are in that way but care from public sector workers is.

Your NHS pension scheme accrues assets so the size of the pot to pay out on promises increases along with the increase in the size of the promises.

I'm not sure how hard you work or otherwise has any impact on your pension rights though. Lots of people in the public and private sectors work very hard, lots of both do as little as they can get away with. The ones doing either thing at work get a far high pension contribution from their employer per pound of salary in th epublic sector than anyone in the private sector.

As I say, the NHS pension scheme is funded. Many parts of the pension system are not and can't be funded as the money isn't there and very likely won't be.

thescouselander

sammyjammy wrote: »

Trouble is probably 50% of those higher paid Civil servants don't know they're !!!! from their elbow so wouldn't last five minutes in the puiblic sector. The civil service is definitely a two tier workplace with jobs for the boys in the higher ranks.

Thats just a massive generalisation based on no evidence whatsoever.

vivatifosi

Generali wrote: »

What do you mean by accrued vivatifosi?

Do you mean accrued like in the pension scheme for which you are trustee or the NHS pension scheme where there are actual assets stashed away or do you mean accrued as in the Civil Service or state pension schemes where unfunded promises have been made?

In this sense by accrued, I mean benefits that have already been earned but not yet taken in any type of scheme. It is my belief that if you have saved for a pension for 1 year, 5 years whatever, then those benefits should not be played with and this is an important principle in both private and public sector pensions. However it is totally sensible for the government to say "we can't afford the same arrangements going forward, therefore we are going to change them", which could include higher contributions by the employee, shift to Defined Contribution Schemes, a move towards career average, lower employer contributions (unlikely for the civil service), changing age of retirement, etc.

The reason I strongly believe this is that no government should take what has already been accrued and that would be the death knell for pensions if anyone stepped over that line, I can't overstate the need for that trust. Pension contributions are in decline in the UK and have been for a long time. There are plans afoot to change this through making people opt out of pension schemes rather than opt in and that may change things, but that will take a while to phase in and some of the details need to be ironed out in order to benefit those contributing (ie the employees not being in schemes that are not as beneficial as they could be). The alternative is people not trusting pensions and - advisedly or often otherwise - investing in alternatives such as BTL, stocks, gold etc - on which they don't gain the tax advantages of a pension and in which they could in reality end up worse off.

I hasten to add a trustee - while knowing more about pensions than the average layperson - is not generally an expert. We still rely on our advisors knowledge in order to do the best for our members, however an individual looking after themselves is very unlikely to have access to such advice.

vivatifosi

Generali wrote: »

My guess is that there will be a partial raid on pension schemes to make up some of the shortfall in state pension savings by changing risk rules in order to force private pension schemes to buy more Government bonds and thus lock in perpetual lenders at below market rates.

Then the government needs to decide what it wants. They can either force pensions to invest more in bonds or they can ask us to pay down our deficits. In many respects the two demands are contradictory and they can't ask for both simultaneously. Doesn't surprise me though. I've been a trustee for over 10 years and the hardest part of it is keeping abreast of the latest government tinkering.

Desperate_Housewife_2-2

Generali wrote: »

Your NHS pension scheme accrues assets so the size of the pot to pay out on promises increases along with the increase in the size of the promises.

I'm not sure how hard you work or otherwise has any impact on your pension rights though. Lots of people in the public and private sectors work very hard, lots of both do as little as they can get away with. The ones doing either thing at work get a far high pension contribution from their employer per pound of salary in th epublic sector than anyone in the private sector.

As I say, the NHS pension scheme is funded. Many parts of the pension system are not and can't be funded as the money isn't there and very likely won't be.

My point is that these jobs knacker you up so it is hard to do that job at 65+ as is suggested.
may seem a tad altruistic but whatever happened to social justice? Surely the public would prefer a team of dedicated hard working people looking after them?

I realise there is no money so this thread is a no brainer anyway...