Transport Act 1962

74 Minister's power to make orders about pensions

(1) The Minister may make orders—

(a) with respect to the provision of pensions by the Boards and the Holding Company and by the subsidiaries of the Boards and of the Holding Company for or in respect of—

(i) their employees, or persons who have been in their employment, or

(ii) persons who have been in the employment of the Commission or of any subsidiary of the Commission or of any body whose undertaking or part of whose undertaking was transferred to the Commission under or by virtue of the Transport Act, 1947, or

(iii) persons who have been employed in connection with the Caledonian and Crinan Canals or Holyhead Harbour, or by or in connection with the Railway Clearing House;

(b) for the establishment and administration of existing or future pension schemes and pension funds for any of the purposes of the foregoing paragraph;

and the Boards and the Holding Company shall exercise the powers conferred on them by the last foregoing section subject to any order under this section.

(2) Without prejudice to the powers conferred by the foregoing subsection, the Minister may make orders—

(a) for enabling employees of any of the Boards or the Holding Company or a subsidiary of any of the Boards or the Holding Company to participate or continue to participate in any pension scheme in which employees of the Commission or a subsidiary of the Commission participated before the vesting date, or in any pension scheme established under this section, and requiring their employers to make payments under that scheme,

(b) for modifying any pension scheme the participants in which include persons of any of the descriptions in sub-paragraphs (i), (ii) and (iii) of paragraph (a) of the foregoing subsection, so as to ensure that changes cannot be effected in the pension scheme without the approval of the Minister,

(c) for varying the rates of the contributions to be made under any pension scheme by employees of any of the Boards or the Holding Company or a subsidiary of any of the Boards or the Holding Company, as well as the rates of employers' contributions and the benefits under the scheme, and

(d) for re-arranging, amalgamating, simplifying and assimilating pension schemes the participants in which include any such persons.

(3) An order under this section may in particular provide—

(a) for altering or winding up any pension scheme,

(b) for varying any trust or transferring any pension fund, or obligations or liabilities under a pension scheme,

(c) for requiring a Board or the Holding Company to make payments to the persons administering a pension scheme so as to convert the pension scheme from an unfunded scheme into a funded scheme,

(d) for establishing any body to administer or assist in administering a pension scheme,

(e) for enabling all or any of the participants in a pension scheme to become instead participants in another pension scheme,

(f) for empowering the persons responsible for administering any pension scheme established for the purposes of an undertaking carried on by persons other than the Boards, the Holding Company or any subsidiary of any Board, or of the Holding Company, to carry out any arrangements for the participation in the scheme of a person who has been an employee of the Commission, or of 'the Boards or of the Holding Company, or of any subsidiary of any of those bodies.

(g) as to the manner in which questions arising under the order are to be determined,

and may contain such supplemental, incidental and consequential provisions as appear to the Minister expedient.

(4) Without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing provisions of this section, an order under this section may contain provisions authorising any person who, having pension rights to which an order under this section relates, becomes a member of a Board, or the Holding Company, or a director of a subsidiary of a Board or of the Holding Company, to be treated for the purposes of a pension scheme as if his service as such a member or director were service in the employment of such a body, and as if, where that service immediately precedes or follows other service which is, or is to be treated as, service in that employment, the two periods of service were continuous.

(5) An order under this section shall have effect notwithstanding anything in—

(a) any local enactment, or

(b) any regulations or other instrument made under the Transport Act, 1947, or the Transport Act, 1953, and continued in force by this Act, or

(c) the Truck Acts, 1831 to 1940, or the Shop Clubs Act, 1902, or

(d) section eighty of the London Passenger Transport Act, 1933 (which contains transitional provisions concerning superannuation funds affected by that Act),

and may amend or repeal any such enactment or instrument as is mentioned in paragraphs (a) and (b) of this subsection.

(6) (a) Orders under this section shall be so framed as to secure that no person other than the Boards, the Holding Company and any subsidiary of any Board, or of the Holding Company, is placed in any worse position by reason of the order.

(b) An order shall not be invalid by reason that in fact it does not have the result of securing that all such persons are not placed in any worse position by reason of the provisions of the order, but if the Minister is satisfied or it is determined as hereinafter mentioned that any such order has failed to secure that result, the Minister shall as soon as may be make the necessary amending order.

(c) Any dispute arising between the Minister and any person as to whether or not the said result has been secured by any order under this section shall be referred to a referee or board of referees appointed by the Minister of Labour after consultation with the Lord Chancellor, or, where the proceedings are to be held in Scotland, after consultation with the Secretary of State, for his or their determination thereof.

(d) The Minister of Labour may, with the consent of the Treasury, pay out of money provided by Parliament—

(i) to any referee or to the members of any board of referees appointed under this subsection such fees and allowances as he may with the consent of the Treasury determine, and

(ii) to persons giving evidence before any such referees or board such allowances as he may with the consent of the Treasury determine.

(e) For the purposes of this subsection no person shall be regarded as being placed in a worse position because an order provides that any changes in a pension scheme are not to be effected without the consent of the Minister.

(f) Nothing in the Arbitration Act, 1950, shall be construed as applying to any proceedings before a referee or board of referees appointed under this section.

(7) An order under this section may be made so as to have effect from a date prior to the making of the order, so, however, that so much of any order as provides that any provision thereof is to have effect from a date prior to the making of the order shall not place any person other than the Boards, the Holding Company or any subsidiary of any Board, or of the Holding Company, in a worse position than he would have been in if the order had been made to have effect only from the date of its making.

(8) The power of making orders under this section shall be exercised by statutory instrument which shall be subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament, and the power of making orders under this section shall include power to vary or revoke a previous order.

(9) Nothing in this section shall be taken to derogate from the power conferred by subsection (4) of section sixty-nine of the National Insurance Act, 1946, to make regulations providing for the modifying or winding up of pension schemes in connection with the passing of that Act, but an order under this section shall have effect notwithstanding anything in regulations made under the said Act before the order was made.