Martin Gallagher, a retired police superintendent who coordinates the Job’s Forgotten campaign group, said the latest failure had further undermined trust in the Scottish Public Pensions Agency (SPPA), which is responsible for administering the scheme.
He has criticised the agency’s handling of the delays, saying: “That trust has been irrevocably broken.”
He also questioned why the agency had faced no action over its failure to deliver the outstanding pension remedies, asking: “Who, I say again, who is going to hold this agency to account?”
The pension remedies will not be completed until 2028
The latest missed target concerns Remediable Service Statements (RSS), which set out the pension options available to eligible retired officers and beneficiaries following changes to public sector pension arrangements. The documents are needed to establish how the remedy applies to individual members and allow them to understand their pension position and how much they could get returned to them.
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It comes as the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman has refused to investigate concerns over the SPPA’s handling of the so-called McCloud pension remedy with one complaining retired teacher demanding an apology.
The remedy followed a court ruling that changes to public sector pensions introduced in 2015 unlawfully discriminated against younger workers. Eligible members have since been entitled to choose between legacy and reformed scheme benefits for the period from April 2015 to March 2022.
Under the Public Service Pensions and Judicial Offices Act 2022, all eligible members were legally supposed to receive their remedy outlining their choice between legacy and reformed scheme benefits by April, last year. But as the deadline was missed, tens of thousands of pensioners have been waiting for payments worth tens of thousands of pounds.
In a July letter, the SPPA told a retired officer that it expected to complete delivery of all outstanding statements for retired police officers and beneficiaries by the end of September. That target has now passed, leaving officers still waiting for their paperwork.
The letter, sent by the SPPA’s 2015 Remedy Programme Team, said fewer than 400 statements for police remained to be produced at the time. It described completing them as the agency’s “top priority within the remedy programme” and said it expected to have issued more than 5,000 statements by the end of July, representing around 97 per cent of the total.
However, the agency warned that the remaining cases were more complicated because members’ records required additional information, processing or validation.
It told the recipient: “Your case falls within a more complex cohort of members whose records require additional information, processing or validation.”
The letter also acknowledged the effect of the delay, saying: “We are working hard to complete these cases and our longer and sincerely apologise for the delay. We know this is a cause of worry and frustration.”
SPPA chief Stephen Pathirana is expected to answer to the Scottish Parliament in a future scrutiny session
The SPPA said accuracy was paramount because the calculations would inform decisions about members’ pensions. It explained that the calculators being developed for the process had to be assured by the Government Actuary’s Department before they could be used.
The agency told the recipient that, if it encountered problems which meant the statement could not be provided by the end of September, it would make contact to explain the position. The retired officer said they had not been in touch.
For officers who have already spent years waiting for their pension position to be resolved, the missed target has added to frustration over a process that was supposed to put right the consequences of unlawful pension changes.
Mr Gallagher said: “Yet another deadline has been breached by the SPPA. They have not even had the good grace to apologise to those denied their pensions this time.”
He said members of Job’s Forgotten felt abandoned by the institutions responsible for protecting their interests.
“The members of The Job’s Forgotten feel completely abandoned by the state they served,” he said.
The group has repeatedly challenged the handling of the remedy and called for those responsible for the delays to be held accountable. Mr Gallagher has also questioned the lack of action by oversight bodies, asking: “Where is the pension regulator? Where is Audit Scotland? Where is The Scottish Parliament?”
Across Scotland, the remedy programme covers thousands of police, firefighters, teachers and NHS staff. The cost of implementing the remedy across Scottish public sector pension schemes has previously been estimated at around £1.7 billion.
In the July letter, the agency said: “We are working hard to complete these cases and our longer and sincerely apologise for the delay.” The letter did not give a definitive figure for how many retired officers remained without their statements after the September target passed. Mr Gallagher said he understood that hundreds were still waiting.
For those still waiting, the latest delay means another promised date has come and gone without their pension position being resolved.
An SPPA spokesperson said: “The SPPA continues to work hard to deliver the remainder of the McCloud Remedy to our members, alongside continuing to support our members to retire and ensure pensions are paid on time.”
“We maintain regular contact with members through our online Remedy hubs and direct to member communications as well as engaging with employers, employer organisations, unions, the scheme pension boards, and The Pensions Regulator to ensure all are kept up to date on Remedy delivery progress.”
We will be writing to members and to the [Scottish Parliament’s] Finance and Public Administration Committee shortly to provide an update on our remedy progress.”
A Scottish Government spokesman said: “We understand the concerns raised by individuals impacted by this situation. The McCloud remedy is a UK-wide programme of exceptional scale and complexity, and the UK Government’s original statutory timelines underestimated the challenge.
“The SPPA will continue to update Scottish ministers and the Scottish Parliament on the progress towards McCloud remedy delivery.”