A FORMER Barbados Defence Force (BDF) soldier wants to know why he has not been granted a pension even though he has qualified.Grantley Simmons, a lance corporal in the Defence Force between 1984 and 1995, told the DAILY NATION he had completed ten years’ service and was pensionable.Simmons served ten years and three months, and under the rules at the time, qualified for pension.However, in 2007, amendments were made to the Defence Force regulations, which require a soldier to serve 15 years before qualifying for a pension.Simmons, 56, of Maynards, St Peter, says any change to the Defence Force policy should not affect his pension as he had done his tour of duty before the new stipulation.“I think that me and some others have gotten a raw deal. I did my ten years and qualified before the amendments were made in 2007. “The policy is that once you serve ten years in the army, you will become pensionable. Now, they have started to pay the pension, they have excluded all of the guys who have done ten years. “The new arrangement of serving 15 years was implemented in 2007, 12 years after I left the army. That has nothing to do with me. The new policy applies to those who were in the army since 2007. It’s a great injustice being meted to us.”Efforts to get a response from the BDF yesterday were futile.
(MK)
