NHS Pension Scheme: McCloud Remedy

On 21 May 2026 I issued a written statement to update the House on progress on delivering the McCloud remedy for affected members of the NHS pension scheme. The delivery of the remedy in the NHS pension scheme is a hugely complex undertaking across the public sector to address the age discrimination that the previous Government admitted in 2018.

In the NHS, over 1.1 million pension scheme members are affected by the McCloud ruling, around 450,000 of whom have already retired. The Department has asked the NHS Business Services Authority, as the scheme’s administrator, to prioritise, where possible, delivery of the McCloud remedy to around 49,000 retired members who are likely to receive higher benefits following their McCloud choice. By 24 June, statements to enable McCloud choices had been sent to 13,982 of these members. Work to calculate and send statements to the remaining members facing detriment is progressing, with a current forecast completion date of December 2027, as set out in my statement on 21 May 2026. Members who have not yet retired will all receive a personalised statement and choice, either when they retire or retrospectively.

I also confirmed in May that the NHSBSA had developed detailed delivery plans for providing remedy choices to all members, including those higher earning members whose pension tax position is affected by McCloud. The NHSBSA has already issued remedial pension saving statements—RPSSs—to 122,036 members and is continuing work to complete the particularly complex statements for 19,694 members whose RPSS remain outstanding. The current forecast for completion of this work is March 2027.

I noted in May that these forecasts and the plan overall were subject to several critical dependencies highlighted by the independent review of NHSBSA’s McCloud functions. These dependencies include procuring external suppliers to supplement the NHSBSA’s capacity to manually calculate remediable service statements, and the release of software to automate statement production wherever possible. In my previous statement I expressed expectations that those dependencies would have advanced sufficiently so that I could issue new statutory deadlines for the issuance of remediable service statements—RSSs —with confidence before summer recess.

The NHSBSA has made progress in maturing those dependencies, including launching an invitation to tender to bolster calculation capacity for RSS and progressing testing on new IT systems that are being developed to automate some elements of statement production. I am pleased to report a positive market response to the invitations to tender. The NHSBSA is consequently taking the time needed to fully scrutinise bids and engage with constructive feedback in relation to the design of the second contract. The automating software has now entered its testing phase and its timetable for delivery will be dependent on the outcome of this testing. I have therefore concluded that further time is required to reduce the uncertainty in the plan timings to a level at which I am comfortable in setting new statutory deadlines. When the current work is sufficiently progressed I will set new RSS deadlines that are realistic and achievable and that protect delivery of normal pension service operations, which continue to run in parallel to remedy activity. I will also publish the independent review’s report and place a copy in the Libraries of both Houses.

Irrespective of when new deadlines are set, delivering the McCloud remedy remains a priority, particularly for those members who are likely to be facing financial detriment. The NHSBSA continues to issue remediable service statements and remedial pension saving statements to scheme members affected by McCloud, in line with the delivery schedule I set out in May. Data is now published monthly by the NHSBSA on the number of remediable service statements issued and remedy choices enacted. This is available at: https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/public-service-pensions-remedy-mccloud-remedy-remediable-service-statements-rss-delivery

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