Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether his Department sought legal advice when it agreed to guarantee the pensions of four members of the Universities Superannuation Scheme who were transferred to the Office for Students in 2017.

The agreement in 2017 for the department to act as guarantor for the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) followed formal advice from the Government Actuary’s Department, including risk considerations. The government takes legal advice in reaching its decisions where appropriate.

The department’s liability in acting as guarantor for the USS was originally valued at £5 million, as recorded in the remote contingent liabilities section of the department’s 2017/18 annual report and accounts. The liability valuation has remained at £5 million for all subsequent years, as shown in the department’s annual reports and accounts: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/dfe-annual-reports.