"Ex-officers say they have been denied their pension and treated like deserters"
An update on the petition challenging the Salvation Army’s (SA) non-payment of pensions and other retirement benefits to its former officers.
Yesterday our campaign gained another boost through the publication of an article in The Telegraph newspaper:
The full text is given below. Thanks to Jessica Beard at The Telegraph and the campaign team for all their help with this. This follows the article published last month in the Guardian newspaper.
The SA continues to promote the view that the charity is “prohibited from making pension payments to officers who chose to leave early”. This is certainly NOT the view of the Charity Commission who maintain that the SA has the authority to give pensions to its former officers if it so wishes. And even if that were not the case the Charity Commission has said it is able to provide the SA with a special provision (tool) to enable them to do so.
This mantra being used by the SA leaders sounds so utterly preposterous, bizarre and pathetic and begs too many questions, e.g.
1. What other pension scheme has a prohibition like this?
2. WHY is it prohibited? By whom? (By an Act of Parliament drawn up and proposed by the SA itself in 1963! This is the governing document for the Officers Pension Scheme).
3. But does the Act really prohibit paying a pension to former officers? (Section3(2)(c) enables the Board to pay a pension “on any other grounds”!)
4. IF there is a law which prohibits then why not change the law? (It’s not rocket science!)
5. Why has the SA not taken action long ago to rectify this bizarre anomaly?
6. Why is the SA being so obstructive and cruel?
7. What has happened to the accruals (forgive the pun) made during the last 6 decades or more?
Then of course there is the conundrum that in one breath the SA says it is “prohibited’ but then the article states "In 2017, it changed the rules so that an officer could transfer a pension after 10 years’ service, but this is still discretionary”. (Actually there is no mention of this in the official Pension Rules and the 2017 policy appears to operate outside of the Rules). One minute the pension for former officers is prohibited and the next perfectly possible. (Although of course the new "rule" was not applied to those who resigned before April 2017). HOW? By making the pension payments from a different fund, largely public funded and without the monthly accruals being paid into it!! In other words this 2017 policy IGNORES the Officers Pension Fund and operates outside of it. This is underhanded, dodgy dealing… one might say corrupt. What happened to those accruals? What have they been, and what are they being used for?
The can of worms is now open. The layers of deceit are unravelling. We believe it is time for the leader of the Salvation Army in the UK and Ireland, Commissioner Anthony Cotterill, to come clean and tell the truth. We are therefore writing to him, asking him to do this through the weekly “Salvationist” publication, to tell the truth in response to the Guardian and Telegraph articles which will have been a source of shock and concern to so many members of the SA, donors and the general public. We are challenging him to tell us all the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth!
philip.mountain@talktalk.net
‘The Salvation Army left us pensionless after 30 years of service’
Ex-officers say they have been denied their pension and treated like deserters
By Jessica Beard. 21 August 2021 • 5:00am
Hundreds of former Salvation Army officers who left before retirement age have been denied pensions because of harsh rules that punish early departers.
Ex-officers said the “incredibly unjust” rules have left them facing poverty in retirement.
Kim Palmer*, 54, from London, said she was shocked that she would not receive any pension despite 20 years’ service. “I spent a lifetime working there,” she said. “They had an accrued pension for me but decided I wasn’t worthy of it because I left.”
Full-time officers with the Salvation Army – an international charity and evangelical Christian church that works with disadvantaged communities – are known as ministers of religion and do not qualify as employees, thus are not covered by the Government’s automatic enrolment rules for workplace pensions.
Instead, they receive free accommodation for them and their families, along with a monthly allowance, currently £1,020. Those who retire with the organisation are given a “pension allowance” and subsidised accommodation.
The charity does not guarantee a pension for those who leave early, however. In 2017, it changed the rules so that an officer could transfer a pension after 10 years’ service, but this is still discretionary.
Ms Palmer, whose monthly allowance was £800, said: “There was no way I could put money aside for my own pension. I have a child so it was always very tight. You aren’t even allowed to take on another job. I would do work for another church but the money went straight to the Salvation Army.”
Ms Palmer received a “termination grant” of £4,000 but said this would not fund a single year of retirement.
Philip Mountain, 57, said he and his wife would get a pittance because they left the charity in 2011. “We were treated like deserters. My wife served for 32 years and I for 21. We will receive nothing.
Mr Mountain, now a music teacher, said many officers had difficulty building up personal savings and so found it hard to leave. “Many want to but can’t because they are financially trapped,” he said. “For us to be penalised in this way is awful when the organisation purports to hold high morals.”
Mr Mountain started a petition calling for change, which has received 1,354 signatures, and is part of a group of more than 130 others in the same position. He said he is entitled to a pension because his allowance slip included pension contributions. He was due a £7,000 grant but this was cut to £1,300 after deductions were made for a course he had taken.
A Salvation Army spokesman said the charity was prohibited from making pension payments to officers who chose to leave early. He added: “We pay a grant to those who resign before retirement age. Our donors expect their money to be used to help vulnerable people and we work hard to ensure as much money as possible goes directly to our services.”
David Kendall, 56, from Hamilton in Scotland, left in 2007. Mr Kendall said he was shocked to find he had no pension after 16 years of service. In 2013 he was told he would receive a pension, but a year later, he received a letter that said he would receive nothing unless he was in financial hardship. “The Salvation Army purportedly fights for social justice but there’s no justice for those in its ranks,” he said.
Church of England clergy receive a “defined benefit” pension based on their service and annual salary. Those who leave early can keep their pension or transfer it to another provider. Ministers of the Methodist church pay 9.3pc of their salary towards their pension while the church pays 26.9pc.
*Name has been changed to protect their identity