(2004/C 33 E/259)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-2324/03

by Bill Newton Dunn (ELDR) to the Commission

(14 July 2003)

Subject:   Is the British Government justified in paying different pensions to different categories of persons working in the British National Health Service?

The British Government rewards workers who in their National Health Service have served a minimum of twenty years looking after patients suffering from mental illness by counting each of those years as double for purposes of calculating pensions.

My constituent served in the mental health field from 1994 to 1999 but then transferred into the field of general nursing — so under these rules her 1994-1999 years would not count double.

Is this discrimination unfair and illegal, possibly bearing in mind the court case Coloroll Pension Trustees Ltd versus Russell in which the statement was made that ‘trustees of an occupational pension fund are bound to do everything in their power to ensure compliance with the principles of equal treatment under Article 199 of the Treaty of Rome’?

Answer given by Mrs Diamantopoulou on behalf of the Commission

(14 August 2003)

On the basis of the information provided, the Commission cannot establish whether there is an infringement of Community law in the area of equal treatment between women and men. It would ask the Honourable Member to provide more details concerning the case of the constituent in question.