§ Angela EagleI beg to move amendment No. 26, in page 25, line 5, at end insert—
'.—(1) The persons to whom section 1 of the Superannuation Act 1972 applies (persons to or in respect of whom benefits may be provided by schemes under that section) shall include employees of a regional development agency.(2) Accordingly, in Schedule 1 to that Act, at the appropriate point in the list of "Other Bodies", there is inserted "A development agency established under section 1 of the Regional Development Agencies Act 1998".'.Amendment No. 26 will enable regional development agencies, if they wish, to offer the principal civil service pension scheme as their occupational pension scheme. Many non-departmental public bodies use that scheme for their staff. It is enabling and does not fetter the discretion of RDAs to choose a different occupational pension scheme, should that be agreed with Ministers.When RDAs are set up on 1 April 1999, their staff will be inherited, along with functions from three public sector bodies—the civil service, whose staff are already members of the pension scheme, the Rural Development Commission, which operates a pension scheme that is analogous to the civil service pension scheme, and English Partnerships, which operates a funded scheme, akin to the local government pension scheme.
1365 The amendment merely enables those, and any other RDA staff, to be members of the civil service pension scheme or, in the case of civil servants, to remain members.
§ Amendment agreed to.