Regular readers will know that I have been concerned for many years at the gradual erosion of the clergy stipend, and both the corresponding decline in the clergy pension, together with the major changes made in 2008 and 2011, reducing the pension to 1/2 of the stipend from 2/3, and extending the qualifying period of service from the original 37 years to 41.5 years.
Having raised this repeatedly in Archbishops’ Council without fruit, I proposed a Private Members’ Motion to General Synod in February 2024, and it was passed nem con. You can read all the details in my article at the time.
I am delighted to say that, after some delay, the announcement was made yesterday that everything that my motion asked for has been agree by Archbishops’ Council, and will be proposed to General Synod in July, with the necessary legislation being brought to Synod in February 2026 (the earliest next opportunity) for implementation that year. The headlines from the press release are as follows:
Significant proposals to enhance pensions mark a major step in supporting clergy well-being
A major step in a significant package of proposals for clergy well-being is announced today, which if implemented will increase future pension benefits for existing and future pensioners.
The improvements are being proposed by the Archbishops’ Council, based on analysis by the Church of England Pensions Board. They include restoring the target pension level to two-thirds of pensionable stipend, coupled with an increase to pensions that have come into payment since 2011. General Synod will be asked to consider these proposals, which will require changes to the scheme rules, this July, with potential implementation after April 2026.
Further work is also underway to increase support and choice for clergy retirement housing, including measures to help clergy get on the housing ladder during stipendiary ministry. There is also ongoing work on proposals to increase stipends and significantly improve the maintenance support for ordinands. The detail of these additional measures will be announced in the coming weeks.
Pensions improvements
The Archbishops’ Council, drawing on analysis prepared by the Church of England Pension Board, is bringing the proposed improvements to the Church of England Funded Pensions Scheme (CEFPS) to Synod in July, following the February 2024 General Synod motion.
The proposals aim significantly to enhance retirement security of clergy, restoring pension levels and addressing long-standing concerns about post-2011 service benefits.
Key recommendations include:
- Restoring the target pension level to two-thirds of pensionable stipend for future service.
- Changing the reference stipend used to calculate pensions at commencement by removing the ‘one-year lag’. This would provide a boost to all pensions coming into payment.
- Uplifting benefits for active and deferred members to reflect a two-thirds accrual rate since 2011.
- Providing an increase to pensions that have come into payment since 2011.
If adopted in full (including the proposed uplift to the National Minimum Stipend), these improvements would provide a full clergy pension after 40 years in excess of £20,000 per annum in today’s money, which together with a full state pension would give an income in retirement in excess of £32,000 per annum. The proposals would mean that an additional £900 million would be paid out to clergy during their retirement.
In addition, further support for clergy retirement housing will be announced in the coming weeks that builds upon the Enabling Choice discussions from last year.
The Rev Dr Ian Paul, a member of Archbishops’ Council who brought the motion to Synod last year which initiated a review of clergy pensions, said: “This is fantastic news, which I hope will be of great encouragement to all serving and retired clergy.
“It is the fruit of many years of campaigning, and I am grateful both to the Clergy Pension Action team, and to John Ball and Clive Mather, of the Church of England Pensions Board, for their hard work and their positive engagement.
“This puts right a serious injustice, and I look forward to further review work on the pension and stipend following July Synod.”
I would like to offer here a few reflections on the process which has led to this, and some of the further outstanding issues that need review.
First is to note the labyrinthine structures of the C of E which make pinning down who is actually responsible for anything very difficult. The process for reviewing stipend and pension is as follows. Archbishops’ Council (AC) has a subcommittee called Remuneration and Conditions of Service for Clergy (RACSC, usually pronounced ‘Racks’). This committee includes diocesan officers, and is chaired by a bishop. They make recommendations each year to AC, but do so having consulted with dioceses and the Pensions Board. AC then debates the recommendations (which I have consistently opposed), they then make a proposal to General Synod (GS). GS then debate and vote on these, and GS of course includes the House of Bishops, and this is then effectively passed back to AC (or rather, the staff under AC), and the Pensions Board for implementation. So: who is actually responsible for the final decision?
The real issue here is the shadow cast by diocesan financial anxiety. Because RACSC includes those concerned about (poor) diocesan finances, it is the question of diocesan affordability which has dominated at each stage—leading, first, to the gradual suppression of the clergy stipend, and the inaction on righting the injustice of retired clergy having had to bear the cost of past financial uncertainty in the pension fund. And the culture of deference also kicks in all the way through; at each stage of recommendation, from one committee to another, there is always reluctance to say ‘Actually, we don’t agree’.
This leads to two following issues in seeing change happen. First, if you want to see change, even if you have a very good case and wide support, then you have to be very persistent, and relentless in asking question after question in every possible context you can find. (One senior leader in the Church came up to me after a particular discussion, and said ‘Well done Ian. I know this is important, but I have not taken action. But you have been very persistent’. I replied, ‘Well, I am nothing if not persistent!’ This person, with whom I disagree on the debates about sexuality, didn’t appear to see the funny side of this!)
But it also means that you have to build a coalition and a team who will work with you. Marcus Gibbs, vicar of the Ascension Church in Balham and also a member of GS, has also been campaigning on this, and he drew together a team on Clergy Pension Action. They formed a Facebook group, which quickly grew to 2,000 members, and a website which included very moving stories from retired clergy struggling with the current pension. The eventual success of my PMM really has been a team effort.
Despite this team effort, a lot needed to be done. Because of the Chinese Walls within the C of E, even when I asked why AC had had no proposals brought to the March meeting this year, no-one could tell me what was being considered, and what was likely to happen. This lack of communication builds distrust, and so the group organised that another PMM will be brought to July Synod—largely as an insurance against not getting what had previously been asked.
The complement to this is that you need to have the right people in Church House to work with. John Ball, who is CEO of the Pensions Board, together with Clive Mather, its chair, have been exemplary in their engagement and sympathetic attention to the issue. John read every single one of the stories on the Clergy Pension Action website, and took them very seriously. Carl Hughes, chair of the Archbishops’ Council Finance Committee, has also been outstanding on the broader financial issues, and this has cleared the way for the changes to happen.
Whatever the due processes, whatever the committees and minutes and actions, whatever the reporting processes—if you don’t have people in the key posts who are open to engagement and sympathetic to the case you are making, it is very hard to make change happen. That is why the process of appointment to these key positions is so important—and why it is essential that, even in what appear to be technical, financial, posts, you must have people who are committed to the mission and agenda of the Church.
All this is part of a reality which some seem to find hard to grasp: the Church of England is an inherently conservative institution. There is huge inertia at every level, and the structures of the Church are designed (deliberately or not) to make change difficult. This can be a virtue when contentious issues around change in doctrine are raised (can you think of any being debated at the moment…?) but it is not a virtue when action is needed on a serious matter of clergy welfare. Someone commented recently to me on social media: ‘I don’t think the Church of England is capable of doing things’. It reminds me of the exchange in Yes Minister:
Hacker: Do you mean to say, when the chips are down, I am responsible?
Sir Humphrey: Minister, our job is to make sure the chips stay up.
My final observation on process is to return to the question: who is actually responsible for the well-being of clergy, and who should be the ones to take action when there is such a serious issue as this which needs correcting? Who are the shepherds to the shepherds of the people of God? I think there is only one answer.
On the platform of Synod, after the vote, Justin Welby came up to me and said ‘I have always thought that this needed addressing.’ I cannot speak for his thoughts, but I know that, in meeting after meeting, he did nothing. Kicking bishops is a popular pastime, and I don’t want to indulge in it, but I confess to having been disappointed that, to my knowledge, not one member of the House of Bishops has been pro-active in following this motion up and ensuring that action was taken (I am very open to correction here). If the House met in public, as its constitution requires, and if proper minutes were actually published, it would be instructive to know how much of their time together focused on issues of clergy well-being and morale, and how much, in comparison, was spent on fruitless and divisive debates about sexuality.
This still leaves further questions to be explored. The PMM submitted by James Blandford-Baker, and which is on the agenda for July Synod, reiterates in more detail what mine asked for (since we did not know what changes would be proposed) but, importantly, also asks for a further review of both stipend and pension. This must surely include the following issues.
What about those who retired since the 2008/2011 changes, and have been on the lower pension since then? Now that future pensions will be put back up to the previous levels, will they be recompensed for the past losses? On the back of an envelope, if each person has missed out on about £6,000 a year, then that is around £84,000 each for those who retired in 2011, and pro rata for others, which, if there are around 4,000 current retired clergy, gives a total cost for doing this in the region of £200m. As a one-off sum, that is certainly affordable, for example, from the assets of the Church Commissioners.
Why do we require 40 years service to qualify for a full pension? What is the rationale for that? It is unusually high for a pension scheme. And why are years in training, when pension from previous employment no longer accrues, not included?
Related to that, why do we have a mandatory retirement age, when that has long been abandoned in secular employment?
Why is the pension based on stipend alone, when much is often made in various contexts of the ‘value of the whole package’? Many clergy, with tied housing, do not own property when they retire, so why does the pension not add a housing element?
What is the rationale for differentials in pensions? There might be some argument for differentials, based on ‘seniority’, for stipends (though that is worth questioning, since bishops have much larger provision for ministry expenses than parish clergy)—but why should this carry into retirement, if the pension is really about meeting need rather than giving reward?
Why is there no scope for clergy to buy themselves out of the Church pension scheme and invest in a private pension?
Finally, and perhaps the most explosive question: what should we do about those clergy who were instructed by their dioceses to sell their property before entering training, thus exiting the housing market for good? We know that some were being told to do that as recently as the 2000s.
The changes being proposed to Synod in July are really good news—and there will be other changes coming too. As Carl Hughes comments in the press release:
This announcement is part of a package which, if approved, will represent a sea change both in clergy well-being and as to the wider programme of simplification of the national church finances.
I hope that these proposed pensions changes will give clergy greater clarity as to the provision for the future but also considerable reassurance as to the level of funding that they will receive and the standard of living that they can expect in retirement.
But they are also just the first stage in further changes that will need to happen quite quickly for all these issues to be addressed.
Buy me a Coffee
Another question.
With the pensions set to rise will the Pensions Board Housing Department take this as an opportunity to raise CHARM rents even higher?
They seem to have a cynical approach to annual rises and link them to annual pension increases – this must stop.
Yes it must. I don’t think they will. A big investment in housing will I think be announced on 9th June.
Thank you Ian for your important part in this process, and to all those who have worked so hard. We now look to GS to make this right in July.
I hope so!
Also voted for by Chichester Dio Synod last weekend! Ian Paul’s paper was one part of the Supporting papers
Great!
I mean, there are two responses here.
First, well done! I know you didn’t do this for the plaudits, but out of a desire for justice. I hope that this is widely recognised within the CofE, and that the grateful thanks of many clergy will be your reward. I take it from the general tone of this (and the short videos on Facebook) that you’re confident it wont get amended or stalled (or worse) at Synod in a month or two?
Second, a comment on the retirement age and minimum service. I agree that it’s very odd. One of the slightly amusing things for me was that at 33, when I began my training for Baptist ministry (having been in full time family ministry for 7 years) I was still technically classed as a “young” minister, and eligible to enter things like young theologian of the year, where the cut-off is 35.
40 years of service on a ministry stipend would require me to work until I am 73 (if we had the same rules in the BU, and mercifully, I don’t think we do), which given the news that Denmark has pushed the retirement age to 70 (by 2040) is not impossible but certainly within the realms of possibility. But, the fact we have got to the stage that a person can begin ministry qualifying as ‘young’, and yet have to work a full decade beyond the time many current ministers are retiring, smells a little fishy doesn’t it? 🙂
Does the CofE really believe that only people entering stipendiary ministry in their 20s will qualify for the full pension? It does feel very arbitrary…
Thanks Mat. Yes, these things will certainly be approved by Synod.
I think the question is: is the 40 years qualifying unusual for pension schemes? And if you enter ordained ministry later, isn’t the assumption that you will have been part of a pension scheme previously? Why should a church pension scheme make provision for you for periods of time when you were not in their ’employment’? The gap here is the period of training, when you cannot accrue pension from another scheme.
Thank you Ian, for your determination and persistence on this matter.
Ordained in 1994 aged 25, my initial period of service (1994-2008) remains based on 37 years for full pension.
So I thought in 1994 that at 65 I would retire with full clergy pension (at 2/3 stipend), and a full State pension, after completing 40 years full time ministry.
Pensionable service for a full pension changed to 40 years in 2008 and then 41.5 years in 2011 if I have remembered correctly. Currently I need to serve beyond my 65th birthday to achieve full pensionable service, and there will be some ‘haircut’ if I claim benefits before age 68. My state pension age is 67.
So the proposed changes – thank you – will considerably restore the deep erosion of pension prospects which has occurred in my 31 years of ministry so far. But not entirely.
Perhaps that’s just and inevitable, given increase in life expectancy. But 40 years is a long time to serve to achieve full benefits, and 68 is quite an age to which to sustain full time ministry in order not to lose any pension entitlement (know any 68 year old teachers, anyone?) If finances allow (and I know that’s a big question!) there’s still room to improve things.
I was ordained in 1993 at the age of 31, and under the rules then in place could have expected to retire at 68 with a full pension. But the 2008 change from needing 37 years’ service to 40 years’ service for a full pension, combined with keeping the compulsory retirement age of 70, prevented me from getting a full pension. The change was justified on the grounds of people living longer, which as I said in my response to the consultations at the time was fair enough, but should have led to a change in the compulsory retirement age at the same time.
The inequity to me is fairly small compared to some of the horror stories elsewhere in these comments, and there were presumably only a few others (if any) affected in the same way. But despite pointing out the inequity in my consultation responses nobody seemed to pay any attention – leading me to doubt the genuineness of the consultation exercise, at least as far as individual clergy affected by the changes was concerned.
So thank you to Ian and others for your efforts in working to increase the value of the pension I can’t qualify for the whole of!
Thanks for sharing your story. It is clearly iniquitous, and I am delighted that the injustice will be rectified.
I was ordained at 29 and have no pension from that prior time – I did a degree, a PhD then two years as a Nursing Auxiliary finishing the PhD and preparing for ordination, then 3 years at theological college. The two years didn’t qualify for an occupational pension, and were in part directed by the CoE
Ian – thank you for your persistence!! This is wonderful news.
Thanks Ian. A concern which applies only to those in CHARM housing is the experienced-based fear that an increased pension will give licence to yet further increases in rent. My pension increased by £15 per month in April. My rent increased by £20. The present ‘below commercial market rates’ mantra is not fit for purpose. Recent rapid rises in market rents allowed the pension board to hike CHARM rents and still stay below the market. My rent increased by 20% in the 18 months after reserving the property. That inflated figure is now built-in to all future percentage rises. As many in the FaceBook group have expressed, trust has been broken and words are insufficient for its recovery. If the promised action on pension is fulfilled – that would be good. (Thanks also for itemising, as you did above, the threads in the tapestry of obfuscation) But action is needed on clergy who are dependent on Pension Board housing. Here a culture change is necessary. In private correspondence I was asked to use my unhappy experience to help prepare retiring clergy for the transition. I replied that rather than preparing retirees for the bruises I wanted to see the Church Commissioners invest in parish mission and relieve the housing department of the constrictions on their work now that 75% of rental income services debt and, among the creditors, the Commissioners’ portion of which is at an extraordinarily high rate. Don’t just pull people out of the river: attend to those pushing them in upstream. The clergy action group thought it wise to make the first appeal a single issue. There are however connections to other pressing matters.
Thanks. On Monday 9th June, further information will be published on various financial measures, and that will include a massive new investment in CHARM housing. I think those involved are aware of the issues you mention—but we need to keep reminding them!
Well done Ian. A magnificent effort. I remember at vicar factory in the 90’s meeting other ordinands who were told to sell their houses to fund training. Outrageous!
We need to document this and gather evidence…watch this space…!
Thanks so much for your persistence Ian. This is excellent news, especially for me and other oldies who are soon to retire. I am fortunate that, although advised to sell our house – which we did (and, unbelievably – miles from home and support networks with three young children – our car – which we didn’t) in 1992, we have managed to buy another house later in life and are looking forward to moving to it fairly soon. I do continue to worry for friends already retired on nothing but a church pension and living in sub-standard CHARM housing. I hope the forthcoming housing announcement will do something positive for them, not least in expediting repairs and improvements to existing housing stock.
dont they get the state pension too?
Hello Ian,
Thank you for your work here and the clear analysis of what is very complex.
I’m wondering whether I can raise with you another Justice issue associated with clergy stipend. I’d be interested in your thoughts on the situation for clergy couples, of which there are now an increasing number. My wife and I have neighbouring parishes and so can easily get to all of the parish areas from our shared vicarage, so no way we could justify the need for two houses. When appointed we were given the choice of which one and having chosen my wife’s, my statement of particulars stated that I had opted to waive my entitlement to housing.
I think practice varies depending on diocesan policy where some receive a housing allowance in lieu of a house but most are probably like us. The justification for the level of stipend is that clergy have these other benefits such as housing and the HLC allowance. Yet for clergy couples in our situation there is one who receives none of these (and in most cases the diocese receives rental income from the second vicarage).
As with other issues the decision is rooted in anxiety over Diocesan finance.
Thanks Mike. Yes, I think that is a good question, and I suspect practice varies considerably from one diocese to another.
Isn’t there a clergy couples network in the C of E? I though Nicola and Richard Moy might be involved in one?
Good stuff, Ian, well done. (Though I do understand why there is a compulsory retirement age – having said which, maybe there’s an argument for raising it? I don’t know.)
What is the reason, when it has been abolished in law?
I don’t of course know for definite; I would be happy to be corrected if I’m wrong, and it’s those who brought the rule in who can give you a definitive answer (and their successors who could remove the rule if they could be persuaded to do so). Be that as it may: my view is that the C of E got its fingers burnt over incumbents who had no compulsory retiring age, who were manifestly past doing the job, but who weren’t going of their own accord and who either couldn’t be removed or only via a disciplinary process in whatever form – all of which did no good to their parishes. There was an aged incumbent in my home city in my adult lifetime who had the freehold for life, and after some time just about managing to get to church on Sundays to take the services, had a stroke and couldn’t function at all; I was told that when the bishop went to see him his wife (who by this stage was doing all the talking) refused to allow him to even discuss retirement (and wouldn’t let him in when he came the second time), and that it was only when the rural dean succeeded in getting admitted and talking about the pastoral breakdown provision that any progress was made – and the parish was in limbo for the duration. Of course there is no question of the vast majority of our incumbents behaving like that, but there would still be a few…..
Forgot to mention that of course in normal employment, aged (and not so aged) employees who can’t do the job any more can of course (if necessary) be removed relatively bloodlessly.
Thank you, Ian. You have been a wonderfully courageous and persistent advocate and it is much appreciated. As you so clearly say, there are still outstanding issues to address. As a matter of justice, those who retired since the 2008/2011 changes, and have been on the lower pension since then, must be recompensed for the past losses and speedily so (and widows/widowers too if their clergy spouse has died). It would be grossly unfair not to do so. Also, you are right when you say that the most explosive question is what should be done about those clergy who were instructed by their dioceses to sell their property before entering training, thus exiting the housing market for good. As someone who is in that category and now in their 60s, it is feels a scandalous injustice to have been told very clearly in 1995 to sell up, even though I had negative equity and so lost more than a third of my savings to pay off the debt, before starting training. Not only did I lose money then, I have missed out on the massive growth in property prices in the last 30 years. As a result, we will have a poorer retirement and our children will have far less of an inheritance when we go to glory.
I share your gratitude to Ian Paul at tackling this with “rigour”!
We also sold our house in the 70s, using some of the capital to fund ordination training. We had to find our own funding… pursue local authority funding and the Church Times TAP charity…. I don’t see how this could be rectified financially. TBH.. i accepted it at the time and was willing to do this. No arm twisting was needed. God has been faithful…but that doesn’t let the CofE off the hook!
One concern is about the fairer stipend pension level for all of us today. It would seem to me that every pension calculation should be based on the current NMS …. not on that which existed when one retired. The maths is easy.
The other is that justice would require a backdating of pensions to deal with the 2011 onward “slippage”. This would also be justice for widows/widowers. Those levels have slipped back relentlessly. Not a few of us from earlier generations worked as couples on one stipend and no other employment. I don’t regret it but if fuller- justice is to be done it shouldn’t be ignored.
Thank you Ian and Carl and others… you deserve a medal! I hope it will all pass through and GS and something we can all agree on. Re the ‘lump sum’ will this go up proportionally or remain the same.?
I understand to. I have every hope that it will go through Synod unscathed.
Thank you for all your work on this. Can you say how any of this relates to those of us who were ordained later in life.
I think it has the same effect for all. Did you have a particular question? Note that so far, all we have in public is the press release. The full details will be in Synod papers when they are released in June.
I worked in HR (in a major nationalised industry) and so an understanding of pensions was important. Most occupational pensions were “final pay” schemes and pension was based on a years worked/60 of final pay with a maximum of 40/60. The pension was index linked so went up with inflation. Private pensional are “money purchase”, you build up a “pot” on on retirement use it to buy an annuity. If annuity rates are low it’s a poor option compared to the final pay scheme. Gordon Brown taxing company pensions has a lot to answer for.
Ian, thanks so much for your work on this.
I understand why the 40 years is in place as the church is not seeking to make pension contributions for previous years when there is not a statutory necessity for some level of provision with auto enrolment from previous employment (I worked as an unordained families minster for the previous 9 years – with pitiful pension provision (essentially irrelevant to this discussion)). I am currently in full-time residential training and so am not receiving contributions into a pension. I am supported by the Church of England (which is wonderful) though this means I am essentially unable to do other paid employment. This three years is a gap between provision from one employer to another. It seems a simple fix to acknowledge that the years in training should count as qualifying years.
Is this possible as an amendment?
Also the historic encouragement / command to sell houses in the 80/90/00 is horrendous – surely this is illegal – they were not trained financial advisers or lawyers. Hearing about Nicholas Pye above and my previous ADDO is just awful.
Thanks again.
Yes, I think the ‘years in training’ issue needs to be addressed. And I think the ‘sell your houses’ is going to be the next big thing…
Excellent work and you are to be commended (though obviously we’ll have to see what actually emerges in July).
It’s just sad that it’s necessary. It’s not the first time of course. Queen Anne’s Bounty was set up in 1704 to deal with underpaid clergy, and the Gilbert Act in 1776 to deal with housing repairs for clergy. You’d have hoped we’d be better at it by now.
Ian,
Many thanks to you and other friends on your dogged persistence in regard to this issue.
In your update you mention the question of differentials. Personally, don’t have a problem with bishops being paid more and as a consequence having a larger pension: biblically, the labourer is worthy of their hire, practically, it’s easier to go up in income than down and who wants to be a bishop anyway?!
What I do think is wrong is, as I read it, is the fact that the differential for bishops et al is applied to their *entire* service. This ‘final salary’ approach has been more or less universally abandoned and is a nonsense. It is also not a ‘good look’ for those who aspire to be true and sacrificial shepherds of the flock.
Hi Ian
Thankyou for everything you have done. I posted onto the Facebook group our experience of CHarm rent rises far outweighing the annual pension increase and really hope this will soon be addressed. For our family, the rent is 3k more than my OH pension- so a big shortfall. He had to take ill health retirement and we had 3 dependant kids at home so needed a larger property.
Getting personal, is this likely to result in the 6k pension increase you mention in the article? This will make a massive difference to us.
Thankyou!
I am very sorry to hear your story. Yes, it will. And there is going to be a big investment in housing which will be announced next month.
Two thoughts, if I may…
Selling one’s house… in the 70s it was expected but I doubt there’s paperwork! I can’t see how this could be quantified. A just pension and catch up might be the only possible “compensation “.
“even when I asked why AC had had no proposals brought to the March meeting this year, no-one could tell me what was being considered,”
There’s been so much stuff on (secular? )management we appear to have lost godly leadership…
Well done to Ian Paul on his motion to improve clergy pensions and retirement housing, which looks now to have been approved by Archbishops Council to take forward to Synod. Hopefully will attract a few more ordinands and keep clergy in their vocation to retirement
As others have said, thank you Ian and Carl (and those around you) for your amazing work on our behalf. I agree with your list of outstanding issues.
To keep up the pressure, I wonder whether GS members can find a procedural way of attaching a request for the outstanding issues to receive focus from the hierarchy, while enthusiastically welcoming the progress made to date. An amendment to James’s motion, perhaps?
That is precisely the plan!
Well done to Ian and all the team on the Clergy Pension Action campaign. It is quite remarkable that a campaign only started 3 months ago has generated enough momentum to get these changes over the line.
I’m struck by how both this, and Justin Welby’s resignation, were both prompted by mass protests/campaigns from within the CofE. I don’t want a CofE governed via Change.uk/Facebook, but at the moment it seems to be a choice between that, and no leadership at all. Your comment about how difficult it was to nail down who was responsible could be echoed at pretty much every level of the CofE.
It did not sit well with me that when I retired after forty one years in ordained ministry last summer at age 66, I was deemed to be taking early retirement and so have a reduced pension.
Thank you for what you have done. You are the only person I have raised this with in the C of E who has ever acknowledged that there were aspects of the pension provision that were not right.
Thanks. That is amazing, and something of an indictment…
Though to be fair, public sector employees now have a standard retirement age of 67 or 68, so for them retiring at 66 would also be deemed ‘early retirement’ with a reduction in pension. The government chose to effectively rip up staff contracts and completely change the pension scheme, incl those who had been employed for a number of decades.
When did the retirement move from 65 to 68? A friend of mine retired just over two years ago after 42 years service ( he was ordained at 23) and the letter from the Pensions Board began by saying “As you have taken early retirement…….” which he did feel a bit rich!
This is good news, and well done to all involved. Sorry if I missed this in the article, but who will be funding these increases? Church Commissioners, or dioceses and therefore parishes? Thanks.
There will be no increase to the dioceses. The money will come from within the existing pension fund, in the light of revised actuarial forecasts.
Re a previous comment about retirement ages. My wife is in the NHS pension scheme, the largest in the UK so presumably not a bad benchmark. The normal retirement age is 65 or the state pensionable ageof the day. 68 would appear to be an outlier.
Really grateful for your persistence in this. I welcome a more pastoral approach (?) in the heads of the Pensions Board. We are stuck with trying to move, and are finding that, because we co-own with the PB, they are stripping us of money every which way. For example, they insist on having an independent surveyor to value the property. Fair enough, except we have to pay, and we can ill afford it, as I have (almost never) been paid. We will also have to pay for their legal fees as well as our own. It seems grossly unfair.
The housing is part of the clergy remuneration package yet is not included in when calculating the pension. But parish share includes housing (despite the fact that my parish paid for the house and I own it.) That is surely inconsistent counting? The stipend is lower because housing is provided. Basing the pension on that element of the package alone gives a false reading.
It is, and it is a major inconsistency.