Alisdair Macleod, an accountant and former civil servant, said this policy “concerns him a lot” as the Social Security Reserve Fund has been built up over many decades and is “designed to cushion the impact of an ageing population”.
“Since 2020, a significant amount of money has been taken out of that pensions pot [Social Security Reserve Fund] as a result of the government cutting the amount it’s paying into the Social Security Fund and it’s continuing to do that in this budget.”
Macleod disputed Deputy Millar’s view that the social security fund was “healthy”.
“I’ve heard this fund described as ‘healthy’, yet the last full actuarial assessment of the fund in 2021, external projected that on current levels of migration, the fund would run out entirely by 2082, and to me that doesn’t feel healthy.”
“Furthermore, when they last updated their projections to include the impact of a cut in the money being put in by the government last year, they projected that that would reduce the life of the fund by a further 10 years.”
Jersey’s Fiscal Policy panel warned that drawdowns and contribution cuts to the Jersey Social Security Fund should only occur after a comprehensive actuarial review, external of future pension liabilities.
However, States Members are being asked to vote on reducing the states grant to the fund for the 2027 budget before the review has been done.
When asked if that was problematic, Senator Millar said: “I think its fair because of of the size of the social security funds as a whole.
“There is plenty of money – nobody needs to be worried about the pensions. We can pay pensions for a very long time with the money we’ve got.
“Even if no contribution went in at all, we could still pay pensions for seven years.
“There not many countries with that level of funding for their pension schemes.”