PENSIONS UPDATE ...
From Capt. Mike Post
(as of 11.04.2021)
'Dear all
There is an op-ed in yesterday’s Times by its Financial Editor, Patrick Hosking, headed , “Sunak’s RPI pension grab is robbery”. This is strong stuff coming from a respected Times journalist. It is, of course, about the government’s plan to default on its RPI debt obligations in February 2030 and the upcoming judicial review at which the BT, Ford and Marks & Spencer pension schemes are challenging the government.
See: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/sunaks-rpi-pension-grab-is-robbery-jlv6dx05p?shareToken=22fe1093285dae9f107cf6fadeb5c043
The article starts: "Rishi Sunak is being taken to court, and quite right too. No, not over his response to the blandishments of David Cameron. The chancellor’s email saying he “pushed” Treasury civil servants to accommodate the former PM’s paymaster, Greensill Capital, looks terrible, it is true.
But he stands accused over a quite different matter — his proposed redefinition of the retail prices index. The pension funds of BT, Ford and Marks & Spencer look quite right to take him to judicial review."
Both APS and NAPS pensioners will be affected by this “robbery”. APS will suffer because after 2030 APS pensions will not receive the RPI increases they paid for. Both APS and NAPS schemes will suffer because they will not receive the investment returns that they were encouraged to anticipate by the government in 2016.
I intend to forward the above headline and link to my own MP and, as suggested by Patrick Hosking in his piece, will be contacting Slaughter and May tomorrow to point out the special circumstances which make BA pensioners so aggrieved.
I am still waiting for a reply from Rishi Sunak to my letter to him on the same topic dated 18 February 2021.
Regards to All
Mike Post.''