Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 21 April 2021
545. Deputy Cormac Devlin asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the effective dates of the last three increases that were applied to the pensions of civil service principal officers in retirement; the level of increase that was applied to their pension on each occasion; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18493/21]
View answerAs the Deputy may be aware, in 2017 the Government agreed the pensions increase policy on public service pensions in payment for the period to end 2020 as follows:
- An equitable approach must be adopted for the various public service pensioner cohorts who are not only differentiated by amount of pension in payment (determined by grade and service) as heretofore but also by date of retirement (in particular pre and post end February 2012).
- Accordingly for those who retired or will retire post end-February 2012, to the extent that they retired on reduced salaries, they will receive pension increases in line with the pay increases due to their peers in employment.
- When alignment is achieved between pre and post end-February 2012 pensioners, pay increases will continue to benefit pensions in payment.
This approach was intended to deal with the ongoing complexities which arise as FEMPI pay related provisions are unwound. Given that this process of unwinding of FEMPI pay reductions will be ongoing over 2021 to 2022 as per sections 19 and 20 of the Public Service Pay and Pensions Act 2017, the requirement for equitable treatment, as outlined above, continues to arise over this period. Accordingly, the above arrangements will remain in place to end 2022 in advance of which I will consider the future policy approach on this issue.
When considering how this policy has been applied to a particular grade, in this case retired Principal Officers in the Civil Service, it is necessary to distinguish between those who retired before 1 March 2012 and those who retired after that date.
Generally, pre-March 2012 retirees will have retired either before imposition of the first FEMPI pay reduction in 2010 or they were protected by the first 'grace period' so their pension does not reflect this reduction. As a result, some pensioners in this cohort were not eligible for pension increases arising from increases to serving staff as the salary on which their pension is based is still higher than the salary of serving staff on the same grade/scale point.
In the main pensioners in this cohort did not qualify for increases if the pensionable salary on which their pension is based is greater than €70,000 - this would include pre-March 2012 Principal Officer retirees.
In the case of individuals who retired from 1 March 2012 onwards the salary on which their pension is based encompasses the first FEMPI reduction in 2010. As a result this cohort of retirees, including Principal Officers, were generally eligible for pension increases arising from pay increases as their pensionable salary was lower than the salary of equivalent serving staff following those increases.
Finally, as in-service salary scales are restored, more individuals in the pre-March 2012 cohort become eligible for increases to be passed on to their pensions reflecting the application of the existing policy that there must be an equitable approach adopted for the various public service pensioner cohorts.
