Question to the Ministry of Defence:

To ask the Secretary of State for Defence, whether his Department has undertaken any review of the position of former Armed Forces personnel who left service before 6 April 1975 after completing substantial periods of service but who are not entitled to an Armed Forces pension.

Prior to 1975 there were no rights to preserved pensions in any public or private pension schemes. Most schemes had very restricted qualifying criteria for the award of pensions. For the Armed Forces, occupational pensions were awarded only if a member had completed at least 16 years reckonable service as an officer or 22 years reckonable service as another rank. Reckonable service is paid service after age 21 for officers or after age 18 for other ranks. Gratuities (lump- sum payments) were awarded to those who did not serve long enough for a pension but had completed at least nine years reckonable service as an officer or 12 years reckonable service as an Other Rank.

The Social Security Act 1973 brought about changes by requiring all pension schemes (not only Armed Forces pensions) to preserve pension rights for those who left service after 6th April 1975 having completed at least five years qualifying service and having attained the age of 26. Later Social Security Acts reduced the qualifying period from five years to two years and removed the age qualification requirement. These changes were not made retrospective. Individuals receive the benefits in accordance with the scheme rules in place at the time of their retirement.

Given the length of time since the change was introduced, I cannot say for certain whether an assessment was made at the time for extending those rights to personnel who had left before this change was introduced. However, it has long been a principle of public service pensions policy, and one that has been upheld by successive Governments, that improvements to pension schemes are not made retrospective.

Retrospection would add significantly to the cost of introducing any meaningful improvements to the scheme because, typically, legacy issues are common to other public service schemes in existence prior to the Social Security Act 1973 and not limited to just the Armed Forces. Where legacy issues are common across public sector schemes, a retrospective change implemented for the Armed Forces would certainly result in pressure from others for similar treatment. To concede retrospection for one group would place great pressure on other public service schemes. No specific estimate has been made of the cost of resolving these legacy issues.

I can confirm that there are no plans to reassess this position.