Pension Legislation for Parliament

Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service, Hon. Fayval Williams, says the Pensions (Public Service) Act to establish a contributory pension scheme in the public sector, is to come before Parliament.

Making her contribution to the 2016/17 Sectoral Debate in the House of Representatives on June 22, the State Minister said both the private- and public-sector pensions need to be addressed.

“In the private sector… reforms that would provide benefits such as indexation, portability and participation in multiple pension arrangements have been pending since the Pensions (Superannuation Funds and Retirement Schemes) Act was passed in 2004, some 10 years ago,” Mrs. Williams said.

She pointed out that a critical component of the pension reform is automation of the business processes, to address the predominantly manual system with paper-based records that take as long as a year to process a pension application.

“Automation will also allow the Government to forecast its pension liabilities. Retirement benefits account for approximately $30 billion in this year’s budget, or about 10 per cent of the recurrent expenditure. Getting the public employee pension administration system completed is a key goal for this administration,” Mrs. Williams said.