Gas Act 1972

36 Provisions as to pension rights

(1) The Corporation may, in the case of such of the persons to whom this subsection applies as they may determine, pay such pensions to or in respect of those persons as they may determine, make such payments as they may determine towards the provision of such pensions, or establish and maintain such schemes as they may determine for the payment of such pensions.

The persons to whom this subsection applies are all persons who are or at any time have been employed by the Corporation (whether as such or as the Gas Council), an Area Board, the National Council, a Regional Council, or a Gas Consultative Council established under section 9 of the [1948 c. 67.] Gas Act 1948, and all persons who were at any time before 1st May 1949 (the vesting date for the purposes of the said Act of 1948) either employed by an undertaker to whom Part II of that Act applied or employed whole-time for the purpose of administering the undertaking of such an undertaker or a part of that undertaking (the expression "undertaker to whom Part II of that Act applied" including for this purpose the bodies mentioned in section 62(1) of that Act, which relates to certain gas and coke associations).

(2) A scheme under subsection (1) above may provide that, where a person participating therein as an employee of the Corporation becomes a member of the Corporation, his service as a member shall be treated for the purposes of the scheme as if it were service as an employee ; and any such scheme may also provide for the like treatment, in the case of any person who is a member of the Corporation as from the appointed day, and was immediately before that day participating in a pension scheme maintained by the Gas Council or an Area Board either as an employee of the body in question or as a member whose service as such was treated for the purposes of that scheme as service as an employee, of the whole service of that person as a member of the Corporation and a member or employee of the Council or Board.

(3) Notwithstanding the repeal by this Act of section 58 of the Gas Act 1948 (pensions for persons employed in the gas industry), any regulations in force under that section immediately before the appointed day (including regulations made by virtue of section 62(2) of that Act), and any pension scheme subsisting immediately before that day under or by virtue of any such regulations, shall continue in force thereafter by virtue of this subsection, subject however to the necessary modifications and to the provisions of any regulations made under subsection (4) below.

(4) Under this subsection (in which " old scheme " and " new scheme " mean respectively a pension scheme continued in force by subsection (3) above, and a pension scheme established under subsection (1) above), the Secretary of State may make regulations providing for all or any of the following matters—

(a) the amendment, repeal or revocation of an old scheme, or the amalgamation of such a scheme either with another old scheme or with a new scheme,

(b) the amendment, repeal or revocation of any enactment relating to an old scheme or to a new scheme, of any regulations continued in force by subsection (3) above and not constituting such an enactment, and of any trust deed, rules or other instrument made for the purpose of any such scheme,

(c) the transfer in whole or in part, or the extinguishment, of liabilities and obligations under an old scheme,

(d) the transfer in whole or in part, or the winding up, of any pension fund held for the purposes of an old scheme, and

(e) any matter supplemental to or consequential on any of the matters aforesaid, including the dissolution or winding up of bodies, whether incorporated or not, the continued existence of which is unnecessary having regard to the regulations ;

but nothing in this subsection shall authorise the making of provision for the diversion of any pension fund to purposes other than the payment of pensions to or in respect of persons to whom subsection (1) above applies.

(5) Regulations made under subsection (4) above shall be so framed as to secure that persons having pension rights under any scheme or regulations to which they relate are not placed in any worse position by reason of the regulations.

Regulations shall not be invalid by reason that in fact they fail to secure that result; but if the Secretary of State is satisfied that they have failed to secure it, or it is so determined as hereinafter mentioned, the Secretary of State shall as soon as possible make the necessary amending regulations.

Any dispute arising as to whether or not the said result has been secured shall be referred to and determined by a tribunal established under section 12 of the [1964 c. 16.] Industrial Training Act 1964.

(6) Regulations made under the said subsection (4) may be made so as to have effect from a date prior to the making thereof, so however that so much of any regulations as provides that any provision thereof is to have effect from a date prior to the making thereof shall not place any person other than the Corporation in a worse position than he would have been in if the regulations had been made to have effect only as from the date of the making thereof.