WEDNESDAY'S NEWS

News on the Pensions Board report
(from Elaine Whitehouse, Communications Dept, RCB)

The Church of Ireland Pensions Board paid tribute to the performances of its investment managers despite reporting a 20% reduction in the assets of the Clergy Pensions Fund during the past year.

Mr Hilary Morrison, proposing the report to the General Synod, told members that the reduction in asset values was partly due to the adverse effect of the stronger euro against Sterling and other overseas assets and emphasised that the Church’s fund managers had turned in “very creditable performances” compared to the much larger falls in world markets.

Referring to the annual statement from the Actuary, which anticipated a “significant actuarial deficit” at the triennial valuation due on September this year, Mr Morrison explained that this was largely due to the “severe fall” in world stock markets over recent years and the parallel decline in inflation and interest rates. Another important factor, well known to employees across the world of work who were worried “more about pensions than their jobs”, was the effect of increasing longevity on the future liabilities of pension funds.

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The members of the Pensions Board, Mr Morrison told his listeners, were “of a single mind” in their determination to do everything possible to maintain a properly funded defined pension scheme, being aware of the importance of such a scheme to those who had made a full-time commitment to the ordained ministry. The RCB as trustee had also been monitoring the situation for some time and Mr Morrison saw no reason to doubt that allocations from General Funds to clergy pensions would continue to be a priority.

Mr Morrison also drew the Synod’s attention to increases in pensions in payment, which had kept pace with the general increases in minimum approved stipend, and to the Supplemental Fund, which “played an invaluable part in assisting those clergy and widows of an earlier generation who did not qualify for the benefits of the Clergy Pensions Fund”.

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