Agenda item

The Executive Member for Finance and Governance and the Director of Legal and Governance Services submitted a report, the purpose of which was to seek approval to changes to the Teesside Pension Board’s Terms of Reference to allow greater flexibility in the appointment of new Members. 

The Executive Member for Finance and Governance advised that from 1 April 2015 every Local Government Pension Scheme administering authority had to set up a Pension Board, whose role is to assist each administering authority in carrying out its duty to run their Pension Fund.

Pension Boards were not decision-making bodies, but instead performed more of a scrutiny-type role. They were in addition to, not instead of, Pension Fund Committees who typically continued to make all the decisions relating to the investment governance and administration of the Pension Fund.

Each Pension Board had to be set up with an equal number of employer and scheme member representatives, and administering authorities had to decide how many members would be on their Pension Board and how they would be recruited.

The Teesside Pension Board was established to have six members – three employer representatives and three scheme member representatives, further detailed as follows:

Scheme employer representatives

Two employer representatives appointed from the separate Councils of Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar and Cleveland, and Stockton-on-Tees.

One employer representative chosen from all of the other scheme employers of the Teesside Pension Fund.

Scheme member representatives

Two scheme member representatives appointed from the recognised trade unions representing employees who are scheme members of the Fund.

One scheme member representative appointed from the pensioner members of the Fund.

Recent attempts to fill Board vacancies had mixed results. A pensioner representative was successfully appointed following a selection process after four applicants responded to an article placed in the newsletter sent to the Fund’s pensioners.  However despite emails to all relevant employers, followed by a further more targeted email to all the larger employers in that group, no volunteer had come forward to take up the “other scheme employers” place on the Board and a vacancy remained.

To avoid a situation where a Board place remained vacant for a long time, the Teesside Pension Board discussed and agreed a proposal to amend the Board’s Terms of Reference to provide additional flexibility in appointment situations where a vacancy had proved difficult to fill.  Any amendment to the Teesside Pension Board’s current Terms of Reference required Council approval.

Council was requested to agree the following change to the existing Terms of Reference:

“In circumstances where no suitable volunteers apply from a particular employer or membership group and a Board vacancy remains, the selection panel is able to appoint another suitable individual to that vacancy from outside that particular membership group, always ensuring that only scheme member representatives are appointed to a scheme member vacancy and only scheme employer representatives are appointed to a scheme employer vacancy.”

Following a vote, it was:

ORDERED that the proposed change, as outlined above, to the Teesside Pension Board’s Terms of Reference to allow greater flexibility in the appointment of new Members, be approved.