Government has overpaid more than £190,000 in public sector pensions

[Kevlar]

12 hours ago, x-in-man said:

Define many. Give a figure.

Every civil servant who worked for government before 2012 paid absolutely zero in pension contributions. That’s at least a few thousand people who will now be retired and receiving a pension. So it is a benefit. They contributed nothing. 

[Jarndyce]

5 minutes ago, Kevlar said:

Every civil servant who worked for government before 2012 paid absolutely zero in pension contributions

Can I confirm who you are including under the designation “civil servant”?   Are you including all public sector employees, or strictly those in the chain beginning with AA, AO, EO, etc - and on upwards?

[Declan]

19 minutes ago, Kevlar said:

Every civil servant who worked for government before 2012 paid absolutely zero in pension contributions. That’s at least a few thousand people who will now be retired and receiving a pension. So it is a benefit. They contributed nothing. 

Not strictly, they contributed their time and in most cases labour, in return for an employment package that included a pension. 

[WTF]

11 hours ago, John Wright said:

There may be several people on government pension pay roll with the same name. There’s almost bound to be more than one person with the same name on island. Without ID cards and numbers being issued, and required to register a death, how would your solution work, in practice? Registration of deaths has no idea if there’s a pension in payment. 

registration of deaths tells government pension payers anyway with name, address and DOB of the deceased  if they were of an age that could be receiving a government pension and pension people can check , if they aren't paying out a pension to the deceased no big deal , it isn't like a whole new department is required because we don't tend to have 100 deaths a day to wade through

[wrighty]

1 hour ago, WTF said:

registration of deaths tells government pension payers anyway with name, address and DOB of the deceased  if they were of an age that could be receiving a government pension and pension people can check , if they aren't paying out a pension to the deceased no big deal , it isn't like a whole new department is required because we don't tend to have 100 deaths a day to wade through

And if those deaths happen in Tenerife, or Peru, or wherever the odd retired Manxie has gone - do you still expect the PSPA to be able to find out right away?

[wrighty]

12 hours ago, A fool and his money..... said:

No it's not. Employer contributions in the public sector are still way above what most people could dream of. A public sector pension is a benefit, simple as.

 

1 hour ago, Declan said:

Not strictly, they contributed their time and in most cases labour, in return for an employment package that included a pension. 

Pension is deferred salary.  Prior to 2012 CS contributions were very low.  They're now, when combined with the employer contributions, about right (within the limits of accuracy of actuarial projections) to fund them going forwards.  The legacy deficit will, over a few decades, reduce in real terms, but there's not much that can be done about it now apart from pay it from general taxation.

[La Colombe]

On 3/26/2024 at 10:07 PM, Steve_Christian said:

Most of it to people who have died but they weren’t informed it seems.

"Sorry to tell you this, but you're dead". 

[Kevlar]

2 hours ago, Jarndyce said:

Can I confirm who you are including under the designation “civil servant”?   Are you including all public sector employees, or strictly those in the chain beginning with AA, AO, EO, etc - and on upwards?

EVERY civil servant of any grade. Excluding police, teachers, NHS, fire etc. But basically every public sector worker before 2012 paid nothing. 

[Mercenary]

1 hour ago, wrighty said:

 

Pension is deferred salary.  Prior to 2012 CS contributions were very low.  They're now, when combined with the employer contributions, about right (within the limits of accuracy of actuarial projections) to fund them going forwards.  The legacy deficit will, over a few decades, reduce in real terms, but there's not much that can be done about it now apart from pay it from general taxation.

Well there are nuclear options available - Ireland brought in legislation that reduced public sector pension payouts for a period (circa 10% but graduated based on amount received) under 'Public Service Pension Reduction' as part of its fiscal bailout provisions in 2011. It's hard to say this would severely threaten inward investment or confidence in the Island, but it would obviously hit a significant number of the population in a fairly draconian way.

 

Ireland was obviously in a much more severe fiscal position, and I believe it removed these measures once this improved. There are some parallels though (large % of public spending, not in control of central bank etc.)

[wrighty]

31 minutes ago, Kevlar said:

EVERY civil servant of any grade. Excluding police, teachers, NHS, fire etc. But basically every public sector worker before 2012 paid nothing. 

When people think 'civil servant' they imagine the people working in offices dealing with tax enquiries, planning applications, health service administration etc.  But most public sector employees are nurses, doctors, teachers, police officers, ground workers, fire service... 

I don't have any figures to hand, but I'd bet that the public sector workers who 'actually do stuff' far outnumber the 'pen pushers'.

[x-in-man]

3 hours ago, Kevlar said:

Every civil servant who worked for government before 2012 paid absolutely zero in pension contributions. That’s at least a few thousand people who will now be retired and receiving a pension. So it is a benefit. They contributed nothing. 

..and bollocks called.  

I was working for the government well before then - and guess what?  I paid pension contributions.

 

I think you are confusing the CS with MHKs, who, until about that time - paid nothing.

https://www.manxradio.com/news/isle-of-man-news/mhks-start-producing-payslips/

Edited March 28 by x-in-man

[Jarndyce]

18 minutes ago, wrighty said:

I don't have any figures to hand, but I'd bet that the public sector workers who 'actually do stuff' far outnumber the 'pen pushers'.

In addition, these people paid a contribution to pension prior to 2012.   It may not have been enough according to contributors here, but it wasn’t nothing.

I’ve noticed that the entire public service gets painted with the same brush as the top execs who got the “golden parachutes” and the “wheelbarrows of cash”, at least by some contributors on here.   Very few of the lower-paid workers find themselves in that position when they retire, but they attract the same opprobrium.

[Jarndyce]

7 minutes ago, x-in-man said:

I was working for the government well before then - and guess what?  I paid pension contributions.

Same here - and I must have been off on the day when the wheelbarrows of cash were handed out.

[Kevlar]

20 minutes ago, x-in-man said:

..and bollocks called.  

I was working for the government well before then - and guess what?  I paid pension contributions.

No you didn’t. At best you paid 1.5% of salary for death in service cover linked to your pension. But that was to provide death benefits only. But you would have paid nothing in actual pension contributions because the contribution level was zero. It was the same for MHKs before 2012. Civil servants only started paying actual contributions when GUS was set up in 2012. Before that. Nothing. Zero. Zip. The pension for those people is a 100% freebie they paid nothing for. 

Edited March 28 by Kevlar

[Kevlar]

12 minutes ago, Jarndyce said:

Same here - and I must have been off on the day when the wheelbarrows of cash were handed out.

You seem to have a complete lack of understanding. What is posted above is 100% factual.