In June 1997, in An Action Programme for the Millennium, the Government undertook to protect public service pensions. In November 1997, the Government announced that the benefit of the restructuring pay deals under the Programme for Competitiveness and Work would apply on the basis of parity to public servants who had retired before the commencement dates; however, in order to protect those retired public servants who would have received less than 3 per cent had parity been applied in the normal way, the Government decided, as a once-off measure, that pensioners should be guaranteed a minimum increase of 3 per cent (or 2 per cent in the case of any pensioners who have already received an advance payment of 1 per cent). The Government also announced that, because those restructuring pay deals posed major difficulties in applying parity, they were referring the matter to the commission on public service pensions.
Following the Government decision in November 1997, my Department issued comprehensive guidelines for dealing with cases. Initially, there were difficulties in interpreting how these guidelines applied to certain groups of pensioners, particularly in the local authority and health board areas. These issues were subsequently resolved and my Department along with other Departments made every effort to ensure that public sector bodies implemented fully the terms of the Government decision.
Officials of my Department have met representatives of the National Association of Retired Public Service Employees (formerly the Public Service Pensions Action Group) on a number of occasions, most recently in March 1999. The issues now being pursued by that association and other pensioner groups dispute aspects of settled pensions parity policy. For example, they want personal long service increments paid to certain serving staff on a personal basis under their PCW restructuring pay deals to be passed on to retired personnel. My Department has made it clear from the beginning that it is a core element of pensions parity policy that such payments are not passed on to pensioners because they are not a permanent feature of the pay scale. This was one of the key criteria set out in the guidelines issued to Departments.
It is not correct to say that "Government policy in this area is being entirely set by trade unions". Trade unions do, of course, have legitimate interests in this area, particularly in relation to their serving members. However, as indicated above, Government policy in relation to PCW restructuring deals has been determined primarily on the basis of adhering as closely as possible to parity as traditionally applied but with certain adjustments to protect the position of those groups of pensioners who would otherwise lose out because of the nature and complexity of the pay deals.
