Million Plus

Changes to the Teachers’ Pension Scheme could badly damage modern universities. The Augar review of post-18 education must keep this in mind, says Greg Walker.

While Brexit and the post-18 education funding review led by Philip Augar are dominating national education headlines, another potential threat to university finances has flown almost entirely under the radar. The revelation in autumn 2018 that modern universities in England will face a huge and unprecedented hike in employers’ pension contributions, starting from this September, is alarming. This increase dwarfs the contribution hikes for employers that those in the Universities Superannuation Scheme face, even in worst-case scenarios for that scheme.

Dr Walker concludes that it now falls to the government—and specifically the Treasury, which was responsible for the TPS and LGPS valuation rules—to consider transition arrangements and provide adequate funding support in terms of changes to the affected schemes, or suspend the changes pending a review of public service pension scheme valuations. Students and communities across the UK deserve no less.  

The full article is available here