The Vehicle and Driving Licences (Compensation to Officers) Regulations 1977

Additional factors governing payment of retirement compensation

17.—(1) Where retirement compensation is payable under any one of regulations 18, 19 or 20, such compensation shall not be payable under any other of those regulations.

(2) If a person has attained the age of 40 at the date on which he lost his employment or suffered a diminution of his emoluments, the Secretary of State, in calculating the amount of the retirement compensation payable to him, shall credit him with an additional period of service on the following basis, namely—

(a) 2 years, whether or not he has completed any years of service after attaining the age of 40,

(b) 2 years for each of the first 4 years of his reckonable service between the date when he attained the age of 40 and the date of the loss or diminution, and

(c) one year for each year of that reckonable service after the fourth,

but the additional period so credited shall not exceed the shortest of the following periods, namely—

(i) the number of years that, when added to his pensionable service, would amount to the maximum period of service which would have been reckonable by him had he continued in his employment until attaining normal retiring age,

(ii) the period of his reckonable service, or

(iii) 15 years;

and in calculating the amount of any retirement compensation payable to him, any period so added shall be aggregated with any period entailing reduction of the relevant pension or retiring allowance because of a retirement pension payable under section 28 of the Social Security Act 1975.

(3) The benefit in respect of the additional period described in paragraph (2) shall be calculated at the same rate as is applicable for the day immediately preceding the loss or diminution.

(4) When retirement compensation is awarded, or when an awarded is reviewed under regulation 32, the additional compensation payable in consequence of any period credited to a person under paragraph (2) may be reduced or withheld to the extent that the Secretary of State may think reasonable having regard to the pension scheme (if any) associated with any further employment obtained by him.

(5) If under his last relevant pension scheme the amount of any benefit to which a person might have become entitled could have been increased at the discretion of the authority administering the pension scheme or of any other body, the Secretary of State may increase, to an extent not exceeding that to which his accrued pension, accured retiring allowance, accrued incapacity pension or accrued incapacity retiring allowance might have been increased or supplemented, the corresponding component of any retirement compensation payable to him; and in this connection the Secretary of State shall have regard to the terms of any relevant resolutions of the authority or body with regard to the increase of benefits and to the provisions of any enactment protecting the interests of that person.

(6) If under his last relevant pension scheme a person would have been entitled to surrender a proportion of any pension which might have become payable in favour of his spouse or any dependant, then, if he so desires and informs the Secretary of State by notice in writing accordingly within one month after becoming entitled to retirement compensation under these regulations, he may surrender a proportion of so much of the said compensation as is payable by way of an annual sum on the like terms and conditions and in consideration of the like payments by the Secretary of State as if the said annual sum were a pension to which he had become entitled under the said pension scheme.

(7) In calculating for the purpose of regulation 18 or 19 the amount of the annual sum which is equal to the person's accrued pension, no account shall be taken of any reduction falling to be made in the pension by reason of the provisions of any enactment relating to National Insurance or Social Security until the person reaches the age at which under his last relevant pension scheme the pension would have been so reduced.