OVERSEAS SERVICE PENSIONERS' ASSOCIATION
PRESIDENT :
The Lord Grey of Naunton, GCMG GCVO OBE
63 CHURCH ROAD
HOVE SUSSEX
SECRETARY :
Mr. C. D. Stenton
HK B 233
RECEIVED IN
233 /
?
11 SEP 1990
Your Ref:
Our Ref:
BN3 2BD
Telephone: Brighton (0273) 721630
37
R. A. Burns, Esq.,
FNMP/RJH/F3HK/F18
Assistant Under Secretary (Asia), Foreign and Commonwealth Office,
London,
SW1A 2AH.
Dear Mr. Burns,
31st August, 1990
15 3/9 wi Copypl
2 Mr Paul : HOD
GF Ala.
нед
R13
SC MrFish (DOM) "for further dirt.
WW
Mr Stone
3/4
My colleagues and I are very grateful to you for giving us the opportunity to meet you on 9th August and to represent to you the situation in regard to the falling value of Hong Kong pensions as received by HMOCS pensioners who have retired to the United Kingdom. I am also grateful to you for having sent me a copy of the Note of the Meeting. The Note is of course only a summary of what was said, and it has therefore omitted a number of points which were raised, mainly in amplification of those recorded in the Note.
I think, however, that the comment attributed to Sir Philip Haddon-Cave in the latter part of paragraph 5 at the top of page 3 does not correctly record the situation and I did in fact try to clarify it. The SPOS was NOT introduced "as a safeguard in case post-colonial governments reneged on their commitments to HMOCS members." It was codified in regulations under the Pension (Increase) Act 1971 with the object of ensuring that overseas pensioners should receive increases in their pensions on the same basis as all the other branches of the British public services. If a post-colonial government, or a continuing colonial government, such as Hong Kong, pays increases in pensions locally, then those increases are deducted from the SPOS. In practice few of the post-colonial governments in the 1970s were paying pensions increases and so over- seas pensioners received the full amount of their SPOS; and in any case as overseas pensions were taken over under the Overseas Pensions Act 1973 the point about local pensions increases fell away after the take-over.
As I said at the meeting, Hong Kong was automatically covered by the SPOS regulations as a colonial/overseas territory and Hong Kong overseas (i.e. HMOCS) pensioners are eligible for the SPOS. In the early 1970s Hong Kong overseas pensioners received a balance of the SPOS, after deducting the Hong Kong pensions increases, as at that time the Hong Kong pensions increases were at a lower percentage than those in the United Kingdom, which are based on the
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