APPEAL TO THE SECRETARY OF STATE

 

SUPERANNUATION ACT 1972

LOCAL GOVERNMENT (COMPENSATION FOR PREMATURE RETIREMENT) REGULATIONS 1982 (the 1982 regulations)

LOCAL GOVERNMENT (DISCRETIONARY PAYMENTS) REGULATIONS 1996 (the 1996 regulations)

LOCAL GOVERNMENT PENSION SCHEME REGULATIONS 1997 (the 1997 regulations)

 

1.      Thank you for your letter of 21 July 1999 in which you ask the Secretary of State to reconsider the decisions of Mr XXX, the Appointed Person, of 28 September 1998 and 18 July 1999.

 

2.      The Appointed Person explained, in his letter of 28 September 1998, that his locus as XXX Council’s Local Referee for the purposes of the Internal Dispute Resolution Procedure does not extend to matters which fall outside the provisions of the 1997 regulations, the Local Government Pension Scheme (Transitional Provisions) Regulations 1997 and the Local Government Pension Scheme Regulations 1995.  He found that he was unable to make a decision on your complaint about the adjustment made to the annual compensation you have been receiving in respect of the compensatory added years allowed by XXX Council under the provisions of the 1982 regulations following your redundancy in 1989.  In his decision of 18 July 1999 he found that you had not produced any further material information or evidence relevant to your complaint and that he was not able to make a different decision from that notified to you in his letter of 28 September 1998.

 

3.      It would appear from your letter and enclosures that you are asking the Secretary of State to reconsider a disagreement about the effect of a further period of employment with a local authority employer on the credited period (commonly known as compensatory added years) awarded to you by XXX Council.  You allege that the XXX Council did not inform you of this at the appropriate time and this amounts to maladministration.

 

4.      The Secretary of State’s powers under the internal dispute resolution procedure (regulations 102 and 103 of the 1997 regulations), like the Appointed Person’s, are limited to reconsidering disagreements about the rules governing the local government pension scheme, which effectively means whether or not these rules have been applied correctly.  The award of a credited period and any abatement required as in your case due to a further period of local authority employment, is not a matter which falls to be decided under the rules governing the local government pension scheme.

 

5.      At the time you ceased employment with XXX Council the 1982 regulations applied. They were replaced, in July 1996, and the provisions of Part II are now Part III of the 1996 regulations.  The award of a credited period and the effect any further period of employment with a local authority may have on this award are not questions that fell to be decided under the rules governing the local government pension scheme, but under the 1982 regulations, which provide no right of appeal.  Nor is there any right of appeal under the provisions of Part III of the 1996 regulations. You may wish to consider whether it is appropriate to seek other means of redress.

 

6.      If you consider there is a question of maladministration you may wish to consider whether it appropriate to refer the matter to the Local Government Ombudsman.  His address is 21 Queen Anne’s Gate, London, SW1H 9BU (telephone number 0171 915 3210).