Pensions - Back to the table
WORKERS, JUNE 2006 ISSUE
After the successful one-day national stoppage on 28 March by members of the Local Government Pension Scheme, involving over a million workers, all has fallen quiet after the promise of further negotiations.
The industrial action brought the employers and government back to a negotiating position proffered to health, civil servants and teaching workers in October 2005, nothing more. The broad span for negotiation – "nothing ruled in, nothing ruled out" – has still left all public sector workers wondering what on earth is happening. Protections for existing pension scheme members will emerge, but so will changes to the criteria of the scheme, such as two-tier or differing scheme options.
These arguments for equalities, whether against ageism, sexism, averaged earnings or whatever, threaten to move the agenda on to one set by the government and its acceptance of the EU Directive on Occupational Pension Schemes.