Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Deputy knows how pensions operate and pensions law. It is the trustees of the pension fund who make the decisions about the pension fund, not the employer or the members, subject to the rules laid down by the Pensions Authority. A covenant or deed of trust will set out the obligations and rights of the employer and others. Everything falls under trust law in that regard.

Trustees have a responsibility to pensioners and future pensioners to ensure whatever pension fund exists is solvent. We could not have a situation whereby people would continue to pay into a pension fund, some people would get a full pension, but then, at a certain point when the money ran out, those retiring thereafter, having paid too, would get nothing.

That is not a situation that is right or fair.

I agree with the Deputy that employers should not withdraw unilaterally from any discussion on amendments to a pension fund in resolving a pension fund issue. We have mechanisms, including the Workplace Relations Commission, through which disputes such as this can be adjudicated on. It may be an option in this case for it to be referred to the Workplace Relations Commission and have it resolved there without a strike. If that is an option, I am sure the Deputy will agree with me that there should not be a strike until the matter has been considered by the Workplace Relations Commission. If employers are going to make changes, they should give adequate notice of any change to the members. The Minister, Deputy Regina Doherty, is working on laws to strengthen the protections for members of defined benefit schemes. Work on it is advanced, although it does run into genuine difficulties. One of the proposals made is to make employers liable for any deficit that may arise in a pension scheme. The difficulty in doing so, of course, is that it might result in putting a company out of business which would cause unemployment. Workers might receive their pensions, but they would lose their jobs long before they received their pensions. As well as that, it could hobble other companies and put them at a disadvantage in dealing with their competitors. There are overlapping issues which all need to be seen in the round.

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