The McCloud Remedy

The McCloud remedy is the government’s response to a 2018 court ruling — McCloud and Sargeant — that found pension reforms introduced in 2015 unlawfully discriminated against younger members of public sector pension schemes. The remedy is now being rolled out across all six unfunded schemes plus the LGPS, and it affects roughly three million members.

Who’s affected

If you were an active member of any of the seven public sector schemes between 1 April 2015 and 31 March 2022 (the “remedy period”), the rules that applied to you during that window may need to be put right. That’s six unfunded schemes — NHS, Teachers, Civil Service, Armed Forces, Police, and Firefighters — plus the Local Government Pension Scheme, which has a separate but parallel remedy of its own.

What’s actually happening

In 2015, all seven schemes moved from final-salary to career-average benefits, with different rules and (in most cases) higher normal pension ages. Members close to retirement were given “transitional protection” letting them stay on the old rules. Younger members weren’t. The courts found that this protection itself was age discrimination.

The remedy reverses the 2015 changes for the remedy period. Service between 2015 and 2022 has been put back into the legacy scheme (1995 or 2008 for NHS, classic or premium for Civil Service, AFPS 75 or 05 for Armed Forces, and so on). From 1 April 2022 onwards, everyone is in the 2015 scheme regardless of age.

The deferred choice

Because legacy and 2015 benefits have different rules, members affected by the remedy are offered a one-time choice between the two sets of benefits for their 2015–2022 service. For most members the choice is deferred — you don’t make it until you actually retire, at which point your scheme administrator issues a Remediable Service Statement (RSS) showing the figures both ways and asking which you’d prefer.

For pensioner members already drawing benefits, the choice is being offered as RSS arrives — a process that began rolling out in 2024 and continues through 2025–2026.

What you should do now

For most active and deferred members: nothing immediate. The choice doesn’t crystallise until retirement, and the scheme administrators are still working through the backlog. The exceptions are:

• If you’ve already taken benefits, your RSS may already be available — read it carefully and don’t sign anything until you understand both options
• If your service spans the 2015 transition and you’re approaching retirement now, factor McCloud into your retirement planning
• If you have specific tax questions (annual allowance, lifetime allowance, recycling rules) the McCloud reversal can have knock-on effects

Detailed scheme-by-scheme guides on the McCloud remedy are being written. Each will cover the specific rules for that scheme, what the choice looks like in practice, and the situations in which the answer is straightforward — and the ones where it isn’t.