- Conference
- 2014 National Retired Members Conference
- Date
- 25 June 2014
- Decision
- Carried as Amended
Conference fully supports the UNISON campaign for transparency and better governance with regard to the pension boards responsible for the pensions of our members, including retired members. It also supports the encouragement of UNISON members to become Member Nominated Representatives (MNRs) on those boards. It is vital to recognise the opportunity this presents to encourage much more representative boards, by ensuring that our MNRs reflect more closely the make-up of our membership, and encouraging more retired members to take up those roles.
Members of Pension Funds need a voice on these boards to fully represent and report on the viability of their schemes. Viable schemes are important not only for future pensioners but equally so for those scheme members in receipt of a pension. That is why retired members must have the opportunity to be heard on pension boards. The ability to influence and ask questions of their pension fund, as set out in Recommendation 17 of the Hutton Report is fully supported by UNISON but present Pension Fund Committees continue, in some instances, to be unsupportive and negative to such changes.
Conference notes that the Service Group Liaison Committee has an agreed implementation project to organise, recruit, train and support UNISON activists who want to become board members.
Conference therefore calls on the National Retired Members’ Committee to work with appropriate bodies within UNISON with a view to encouraging the involvement of retired members as MNRs.