Judges to face immediate choice in McCloud solution

In a consultation response published on Thursday, the Ministry of Justice took the unexpected decision to deviate from the approach chosen to solve the age discrimination issue by the rest of the public sector, announced earlier this month.

The deferred choice underpin remedy for discrimination arising from the 2015 public sector pension reforms would see members choose at retirement which of the two schemes — reformed or legacy (as it existed prior to the 2015 reforms) — they wish to be in.

Steve Barclay, chief secretary to the Treasury, said at the time that the deferred choice underpin was the preferred option by the respondents to the Treasury’s consultation, as it offers members better prospects in retirement.

“It is clear to me that the deferred choice underpin will provide greater certainty for members and is also the right approach for schemes and the government,” he noted.

“It avoids the need for members to make assumptions around things such as their future public service career and retirement age, which would increase the risk of making an incorrect decision, particularly for younger members. It also results in a more manageable administrative challenge for schemes as the overall task will be spread over decades, rather than just a few years.”

However, in its own consultation response, the MoJ said that the immediate choice option, which will be presented in 2022, would be best for members of the judges pension scheme, despite acknowledging the concerns about such a route raised during the course of the consultation.

The chosen option will “allow [judges] to make a retrospective choice of pension scheme membership backdated to April 1 2015, when the discrimination began, until March 31 2022, after which all judges would move to a reformed pension scheme”, the document stated.

Judges will be able to choose between the pre-2015 schemes, either the Judicial Pension Scheme or the Fee-Paid Judicial Pension Scheme, and the New Judicial Pension Scheme established in 2015.

The choice will be offered to those “aged under 55 on April 1 2012 and in service on or before March 31 2012 and on or after April 1 2015, and eligible for a judicial pension on those dates”.

Those due to retire sooner will be offered the choice earlier than the 2022 date earmarked for the majority of members, however.

There were 33 respondents to the consultation. The MoJ noted concerns about the decision, but said that the government remains of the view “that running an options exercise in 2022 is the best way of addressing the discrimination”.  

The government will bring forward legislation “when parliamentary time allows, and subsequently equalise treatment across the judiciary by moving all judges to a new reformed pension scheme”, it continued.

Parliamentary timetables permitting, it said it anticipates the reformed scheme will commence on April 1 2022, “with the options exercise taking place later that year”.

Further legislation will be required to amend relevant scheme regulations, which will be the subject of further consultation.