As to (ii), in sterling purchasing power erms and this is the root of the problem your letter seeks to deal with, it is not true to say that pension increases awarded by the Hong Kong Government are larger than those awarded by H.M.G. If it were true no payments would be made to Hong Kong pensioners under the SPOS arrangements. As you will know those who retired before the effective date of the 1976 changes to those arrangements receive quite substantial payments and they would not if what you say were true. In this connection may I remind you that various guides to the SPOS arrangements include the following:
"...The Governments policy on paying supplements to overseas pensioners was, and still is, to ensure that they should receive topping up sums from...to bring their pensions up to the level of their British counterparts...
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This is an excerpt from a booklet sent to me by the Crown Agents in January 1983, that is to say 18 months after I retired. Incidentally were my pension to be brought up to the level of my U.K. counterparts I should now be receiving about £8000/9000 a year under the SPOS arrangements; but I receive nothing. You will note that contrary to what you say the scheme described in this extract would: '... provide a safeguard against fluctuations in the sterling value of the basic pension...' and for the sterling value of cost of living increases too. It follows from this that H.M.G has reneged on the undertaking in this guide.
May I also remind you that in his letter to Mr.Maude dated 10.9.90, the letter which you are now belatedly dealing with, Mr. Mansell demonstrated that a U.K. civil servant retiring on the same day as Mr. Mansell and with the same basic pension would now be receiving £1,441 a month compared with £1,100 which he actually receives. Your reply to Mr.Keith Speed passes over this very valid point.
As to (iii), it would be difficult to prove without comparative job studies that salaries in Hong Kong were or are higher than in the U.K.; but in any event they reflect Hong Kong analogues which include overseas service inducements. The fact that for long periods it was difficult to recruit staff to the Hong Kong civil service from the U.K. and to retain those that were attracted to Hong Kong seems to suggest that the salaries were not substantially higher there than in the U.K. civil service. In this connection account should also be taken of the fact that in general Hong Kong pensioners worked a six day week during their service.
I have demonstrated that the explanations in your letter to Mr. Speed fail to support the statement made by Mr.Maude and quoted in the second paragraph of this letter. However, even were they to have some validity they would be more than cancelled out by factors which work in the other direction.
For example, Hong Kong civil servants are prisoners of their pension scheme to a much greater extent than their U.K. counterparts. The latter can I believe resign and if