Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, pursuant to the Answer of 24 June 2021 to Question 18566, on Merchant Navy Officers Pension Fund Scheme, what estimate he has made of the projected average entitlement for members of the Merchant Navy Ratings Pension Fund pension scheme through the Natural Environment Research Council and British Antarctic Survey.

The Merchant Navy Ratings Pension Fund (MNRPF) is a multi-employer pension scheme and it is therefore not possible for any single participating (current or past) employer to estimate it’s share of any liabilities. This is a closed pension scheme and we do not know for certain if there are either active or deferred members of MNRPF who were previously employees of UK Research Innovation (UKRI) (or its predecessor organisations - NERC/BAS/NOC). However, it is possible, as not all of the former employees who were members of this pension scheme will have reached the scheme retirement age yet. As they are no longer employees, UKRI have no record of their current pension scheme memberships or entitlements.