BP is not a poor company. It has a very good pension scheme , with a fund which was created  to be paid over time to its staff. Till payments are due, the fund can be invested for the  benefit the economy – fulfilling  BP’s stated objective of sustaining the planet.

Unaccountably, BP is considering paying a huge premium – likely to be between £5-6 bn to insurance companies to take the pension scheme away from it so that its balance sheet can be pensions free.

In the meantime , BP has gone into a pensions lockdown, refusing to pay away even a tiny portion of its pension surplus as discretionary increase, expected by its pensioners.

I say “expected”, because if you say you will pay discretionary increases at times when inflation is high and the scheme can afford to do so, then people believe you.

Of course this just doesn’t go for BP. But if BP gets away with cutting out discretionary pension payments and selling the pension scheme to the insurers , then it will have set an unworthy example to the rest of corporate Britain.

Why I’m backing the BP action group

Britain has spent 70 years amassing £1.5 trillion in DB pensions. It is in need of the money that can be invested, to be invested in Britain! It can do with having affluent pensioners who spend their pensions in Britain. That’s why , we – the taxpayers – sponsored the build up of these pension funds foregoing corporate and personal taxation.

BP – British Petroleum, does not exist outside the context of the country in which it is domiciled and pays its taxes, it is at the very heart of our economy. So why are we letting BP sell its pension scheme, exchanging UK gilts for corporate debt (much overseas)? Why allow it to get away with not paying the reasonably expected discretionary increases?

BP Pensions need to be paid as pensions and not as insurance annuities.