§ Mr. BradyTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the compulsory retirement ages which apply to employees of his Department and of executive agencies and other public sector bodies for which it is responsible, broken down by grade or job title. [7239]
§ Mr. BlunkettInformation on the normal retirement age and on compulsory early retirement or severance for my Department and for the executive agencies and public sector bodies for which my Department is responsible is as follows.
The normal retirement age for non-industrial staff is 60, and for industrial staff 65. However, the age retirement policy for grades between Administrative Assistant and Executive Officer (including equivalent grades, except certain Prison Service specific grades) has been temporarily relaxed. Staff in these categories who would normally retire at age 60 can choose to stay on until 31 March 2002, subject to health and efficiency considerations. Staff at Higher Executive Officer level and above can also apply for extensions of service subject to business needs, but the expectation is that they would normally retire on reaching the age of 60.
A variation to this policy is applied in the Prison Service where pre "fresh-start" Prison Officers employed before 1987 retire at age 55, and Operational Support Grades retire at 65.
1204WThe compulsory early retirement or severance procedures followed in the Home Office are subject to the conditions set out in paragraphs 11.5 and 11.6 of the Civil Service Management Code. As a pre-redundancy measure, Departments and agencies may call for volunteers to leave on compulsory terms to avoid compulsory redundancy procedures. Staff may also be retired on compulsory early retirement or severance terms on grounds of structure, and on early retirement on grounds of limited efficiency. Early retirement applies to staff aged 50 or over, early severance applies to staff aged under 50.
The Home Office's age retirement policy is currently under review.