A decades-old amendment to the Pensions Act that resulted in thousands of civil servants receiving a reduced pension after retirement may be rectified.
General secretary of the Unity Workers’ Union, Caswell Franklyn, said he drew the matter to the attention of Prime Minister, Mia Amor Mottley last October and pointed out that the amendment to the Pensions (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1975-31, which was made in 1975, was “unconstitutional”.
He said Mottley had subsequently informed him last October that the matter would be dealt with.
Speaking at an election meeting on Thursday night at Carrington Village, St Michael, Mottley publicly announced that a working group would be established to review the matter.
Legal opinion
“I asked the former Chief Justice to do a legal opinion, which he did after discussing it first with Caswell Franklyn, who came to me, and then secondly with other representatives of unions, including the Barbados Workers’ Union.
“When Mr Barrow (Prime Minister Errol Barrow) passed the amendment to the Pension Act in 1975 it appears as though that it was not done in accordance with the rules of our Constitution. And it therefore puts us in a difficult position with respect to the constitutionality of those provisions even though they are 51 years old,” she said.
Franklyn, who held a press conference at his Unity Workers’ Union headquarters at Belleville, St Michael, yesterday said the deficiency in the amendment needed to be addressed urgently even though he acknowledged that “it will not be an easy fix”.
“It is not something that you can just rush off and do overnight but I can’t set their [Government] agenda. All I can do is hope that they have recognised that people are suffering, and they can say, ‘Oh, it wasn’t us’. We’re only trying to fix it now, but I still need that level of some sort of urgency in the matter,” he said.
Franklyn, who was appointed an Opposition Senator in 2018 by then Opposition Leader Joseph Atherley, also sought to clear the air on his relationship with the Prime Minister.
“I have started to get some feedback. People tell me that I joined back the Barbados Labour Party and all kinds of stuff. That is as far from the truth as you can get. I have not joined any political party.
“My main mission and only mission is to look out for the people who pay union dues to Unity Workers’ Union, but it will affect everybody else, even though you might not be a member of Unity Workers’ Union because as long as you’re working in the Public Service, this will cover you.”
He also revealed that he had previously taken the matter to Opposition Leader Ralph Thorne, hoping that he would file an action before the High Court but he lamented that he left disappointed after Thorne told him: “That will break the Government.”
When contacted yesterday, Thorne said he had no recollection of the situation.
However, Franklyn explained that the amendment affected all the pensions which fell under the act, including the Public Employees Pension Act,
the Pensions Act, Teachers (Secondary Schools) Pensions Act, Widows And Children Pensions Act and Statutory Boards (Pensions) Act.
Pointing out that people had found their pensions reduced to as much as $2 000, Franklyn said he got involved in the matter after a former employee of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital complained that he had lost $1 500 due to the reduction of his pension and was now unable to meet his financial obligations.
“This case pushed me over the edge. And I did my research and I came to the conclusion that the pension arrangements from 1975, that’s 51 years ago, were unconstitutional and that depriving people of their pensions was against the law,” Franklyn said.
‘Unfair’
The union boss also expressed disappointment that other trade unions did not pursue this matter on behalf of their members.
A former employee who recently received notification from the Accountant General about her pension being reduced told the Sunday Sun that this system was “unfair”.
“After putting in over 40 years in the civil service it is unfair that Government would now seek to reduce your pension. Have a heart. We are people that work hard. This is heartless,” she said, adding that the letter was sent to a lawyer for a review.
The letter stated: “Our records indicate that you entered the service after September 1, 1975, and have reached your 67th birthday. You are therefore required to apply to National Insurance and Social Security for your contributory old age pension.
“In accordance with the terms of your Pension Fund Plan, your pension will be reduced by the amount of pension received from National Insurance and Social Security. The Treasury will pay the difference between your NIS and service pension if the NIS pension is the lesser of the two.” (MB)
