LGPS Investments

bigadaj

patchwork_cat wrote: »

Well my DH is paid £15k less than that and receives a pension contribution equivalent to £3600 a year. I think your £10k a year is heavy for a pension when you consider that my DH started his pension contributions at 25.

My DH doesn't get any overtime either and is expected to attend evening meetings etc. My DH has had no pay rises in 4 years, not even inflation. I think if you are being honest you will accept that this is not good and that is why they can not recruit.

Right so you're talking ten grand less, depends on where you are in the country. Not sure how the pension contribution are calculated, as I thought we were talking about defined benefit pensions which would normally be valued at say 25% of base salary.

Obviously depends on what the works involve, the budget you quote is pretty low in comparison to the private sector.

They can certainly recruit as we've had similar issues, what we tend to find is that we're talking graduates from further down the food chain, there is such an excess of graduates around now that recruitment is never a problem, all depends on who you want.

We're continually under threat of redundancy also with clients cutting both budgets and fees, the sensible ones went to oz a few years ago for six figure salaries though I know some of the. Are now getting kicked out if they haven't fully gone through permanent residency, I'm just saying things are bad here and getting worse.

patchwork_cat

bigadaj wrote: »

Right so you're talking ten grand less, depends on where you are in the country. Not sure how the pension contribution are calculated, as I thought we were talking about defined benefit pensions which would normally be valued at say 25% of base salary.

Obviously depends on what the works involve, the budget you quote is pretty low in comparison to the private sector.

They can certainly recruit as we've had similar issues, what we tend to find is that we're talking graduates from further down the food chain, there is such an excess of graduates around now that recruitment is never a problem, all depends on who you want.

We're continually under threat of redundancy also with clients cutting both budgets and fees, the sensible ones went to oz a few years ago for six figure salaries though I know some of the. Are now getting kicked out if they haven't fully gone through permanent residency, I'm just saying things are bad here and getting worse.

They can't recruit as recruitment in LA is completely different to private sector. LA recruitment is very rigid, you can't appoint people with differing qualifications to the same post level. It is very complex, there are essential criteria for a certain post and if you don't satisfy that criteria you can't even get called to interview.

LA has lost a lot of staff to Aus/NZ in fact my DH lost a member of staff to NZ recently.

I don't know what you mean by the 25% base salary valuation.

bigadaj

patchwork_cat wrote: »

They can't recruit as recruitment in LA is completely different to private sector. LA recruitment is very rigid, you can't appoint people with differing qualifications to the same post level. It is very complex, there are essential criteria for a certain post and if you don't satisfy that criteria you can't even get called to interview.

LA has lost a lot of staff to Aus/NZ in fact my DH lost a member of staff to NZ recently.

I don't know what you mean by the 25% base salary valuation.

I think this is the problem, that most public sector don't understand what they have.

To buy a defined benefit scheme in the open market would generally cost 25-30% of the base salary, this is what it would cost you to buy as an annuity. So on a 35k base salary the pension would be worth in the order of 10k putting the equivalent salary near to my original estimate.

Also my experience is that the quality of public sector staff is still pretty poor, obviously a sweeping statement and there are good people, but some of these have left. I would be demoralised if I saw colleagues doing little for similar money which has a spiralling effect.

To be honest I didn't think there were many engineers left at councils, most of the works have been privatised and outsourced to generate efficiency gains. Much of the work would seem to be things such as highway and building maintenance which isn't utilising high level skills in general. My experience is with environment agency staff, with much part time working, flexi time and little practical knowledge or experience.

patchwork_cat

bigadaj wrote: »

I think this is the problem, that most public sector don't understand what they have.

To buy a defined benefit scheme in the open market would generally cost 25-30% of the base salary, this is what it would cost you to buy as an annuity. So on a 35k base salary the pension would be worth in the order of 10k putting the equivalent salary near to my original estimate.

Also my experience is that the quality of public sector staff is still pretty poor, obviously a sweeping statement and there are good people, but some of these have left. I would be demoralised if I saw colleagues doing little for similar money which has a spiralling effect.

To be honest I didn't think there were many engineers left at councils, most of the works have been privatised and outsourced to generate efficiency gains. Much of the work would seem to be things such as highway and building maintenance which isn't utilising high level skills in general. My experience is with environment agency staff, with much part time working, flexi time and little practical knowledge or experience.

I am not going to change your opinion and you are not going to change mine. DH has diversified and is a project manager more now, he too has issues with the EA, but they have suffered from massive cuts just like him and they are too busy.

If DH takes all his pension in a lump sum he will get £240K after 40 years of contributions, not that brilliant is it. ( That figure is before the change to average earnings) If he lives past 77 and doesn't take a lump sum then he might actually get back what he has paid in!

I would like to point out that local govt. pension is a pension fund and not like the police et al where the pension is paid out of budget, nor like the old central govt non contributory.

bigadaj

patchwork_cat wrote: »

I am not going to change your opinion and you are not going to change mine. DH has diversified and is a project manager more now, he too has issues with the EA, but they have suffered from massive cuts just like him and they are too busy.

If DH takes all his pension in a lump sum he will get £240K after 40 years of contributions, not that brilliant is it. ( That figure is before the change to average earnings) If he lives past 77 and doesn't take a lump sum then he might actually get back what he has paid in!

I would like to point out that local govt. pension is a pension fund and not like the police et al where the pension is paid out of budget, nor like the old central govt non contributory.

We're all entitled to our own opinion. I just want to ensure that it is based on actual fact and real comparison and would hope your other half would be similar. I don't understand where you get your lump sum of pension from, based on current benefits and contributions he would get a pension based on a percentage of salary, is this what your lump sum is based on?

It's generally easier to use current sums and costs and ignoring inflation, so a lump sum of 240k would currently by a man a pension at 65 of around £8000 per year index linked with limited guarantee. Is this really what his pension is protected to pay? If not give the current projected pension and we can work back from that. If we're looking at 50% salary then that would give a pension of say 17k which in the open market it would project to a pension pot of around half a million.
I don't really want to get into an argument just have a discussion based on actual figures and show how things really are in the private sector. I currently contribute 15% of my salary with a 5% employer contribution and realise I won't get anywhere near half my salary. This simply means investing elsewhere, makin use of isas and working until I can retire, my father is currently late seventies and still working. Though more down to preference than need.

I am also responsible for generating all my work from clients, which is now extremely competitive and have far less employment security. We are all project managers, I dislike using the term as it has become so degraded that it means nothing.

taktikback

I'm guessing were talking about 20 years LA membership so far - with a prospective 40? At £25000 on the current final salary scheme (which although changing to career average and 1/49th accrual will probably pay better if he is not going to be promoted further..) - we are talking about around 2/3rds £25,000 (ignoring lump sums and the1/80ths accrual up to 2008). That's £16500 indexed linked - would cost around £550k on the open market...

quotememiserable

bigadaj wrote: »

I'm guessing a total package of around 50k in private sector depending in where you are in the country.

That certainly is a guess, then everyone's taking it as a fact. £1.7m is tiny budget, I know people in the utility sector with £50m budgets to control and at a salary of around £35k.

bigadaj

quotememiserable wrote: »

That certainly is a guess, then everyone's taking it as a fact. £1.7m is tiny budget, I know people in the utility sector with £50m budgets to control and at a salary of around £35k.

I was estimating in terms of qualifications and experience rather than budget. It obviously depends what type of work is being done, level of responsibility and how people define the works. Stating being in charge of a large budget often is an indication that the complexity of the works is quite low, or that the more complex works are being undertaken by specialists and the project manager is a qs or accountant simply signing off sums.