Employee relations: Pension reforms

Despite the redundancies, pay freezes and change programmes sweeping the public sector, strike action has so far been isolated and piecemeal. But pension reforms could be about to change all that.

Lord Hutton’s final report into reforming the public pensions system has recommended an end to final salary schemes in the sector, to be replaced with a model based on career average. With retirement ages and contribution levels also set to rise, there is barely a public sector employee who will not be affected. So could pensions reform bring the simmering pot of industrial relations strife to the boil?