Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact of making the recent extension of the relaxation of NHS pensions rules permanent.

We have announced the intention to implement new permanent retirement flexibilities which benefit all staff groups. A consultation on detailed proposals will be published in due course, which is expected to include a new partial retirement option and allowing retired staff to accrue further pension when returning to service.

The consultation will also propose the permanent removal of the 16-hour rule which limited the work retired staff could do in the first month upon returning to service. This has been suspended since March 2020 due to the response to the pandemic. The Department has also continued the suspension of pension abatement for nurses and other staff who claimed their pension early using special class retirement rights to 31 March 2025.