CONFIDENTIAL
CATEGORIES OF PENSIONERS AFFECTED,
17. The overseas pensions field is complex.
Whatever decision were taken
as to the categories of officers to be affected by a new policy there would
still be a volume of work thrown up in dealing with representations on behalf
of those excluded. The Minister of Overseas Development considers that on
grounds of number and costs two major groups must be excluded:-
HMG has
(i) Local ie indigenous pensioners of overseas governments. never contributed towards the cost of local pensioners even when the overseas government has defaulted and considerable personal hardship has resulted.
The total possible bill once this line were breached is not known with any exactitude but would be of the order of at least £10m per year.
(ii) Pensioners who were in quasi-governmental service such as local
government and universities. The ODM is often under pressure from those who hold that expatriate pensioners in quasi-governmental service should have the same safeguards and treatment as pensioners who were in government service but believes that this line too should be held. There would otherwise by many problems of definition and verification of entitlement and the annual bill to cover expatriate pensioners from quasi-governmental service could well prove
to be even larger than that for local pensioners. There could also even be
consequential embarrassment so far as concerns the pensions situation in the United Kingdom.
18.
If the propositions in 17(i) and (ii) are accepted the problem becomes one of definition within the expatriate government service field.
19.
In the colonial field HMG has accepted special obligations towards those
who were:-
or
(i) members of the Colonial Unified Service or its successor HMOCS
(ii) are designated under the Overseas Service Aid Scheme
or (iii) are covered by Public Officers Agreements
A
or (iv) are certifiable as "overseas officers" for British pensions
increases legislation purposes.
7.
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CONFIDENTIAL