Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to help ensure that NHS staff who took partial retirement and subsequently apply for Voluntary Redundancy are not disadvantaged in their entitlement to contractual redundancy payments.

Entitlement to contractual redundancy payments is set out in the Agenda for Change NHS terms and conditions of service handbook, under section 16, for National Health Service staff that are on Agenda for Change contracts in England, or those whose terms refer dynamically to the Agenda for Change. The NHS national voluntary redundancy scheme follows the same Agenda for Change principles.

Where an employee has taken partial retirement, the Department expects employers to apply the contractual redundancy provisions to the individual’s circumstances and ensure that staff are treated fairly and consistently.

Taking partial retirement does not make staff ineligible for redundancy payments, however, it will affect how any contractual redundancy payment is calculated. In line with Agenda for Change paragraph 16.6, service which has been used to calculate previous pension benefits does not count again when calculating a contractual redundancy payment. Statutory redundancy entitlements are separate and should be met in accordance with statutory rules.