Police Pensions Act 1948
Police Pensions Act, 1948
(11 & 12 Geo. 6.) CHAPTER 24.
An Act to make provision as to the pensions to be paid to and in respect of members of police forces and as to the length of the period of their service, to amend and repeal with savings certain statutory provisions relating to the pensions to be paid to and in respect of members of police forces and as to the length of their service, and for purposes connected with the matters aforesaid.
[24th March 1948]
Be it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:—
1 Police pension regulations.
(1) Regulations to be made by the Secretary of State, with the consent of the Treasury and after consultation with the Police Council, shall make provision—
(a ) as to the pensions which are to be paid to and in respect of members of police forces, whether as of right or otherwise; and
(b ) as to the contributions in respect of pension rights which are to be made by members of police forces; and
(c ) as to the times at which and the circumstances in which members of police forces are or may be required to retire otherwise than on the ground of misconduct.
(2) Without prejudice to the generality of the provisions of the preceding subsection, any such regulations shall provide for the payment subject to the provisions of the regulations—
(i) of pensions to and in respect of persons who cease to be members of a police force after having served for such period as may be prescribed by the regulations;
(ii) of pensions to and in respect of persons who cease to be members of a police force after such shorter period as may be prescribed by the regulations by reason of infirmity of mind or body;
(iii) of pensions to and in respect of persons who cease to be members of a police force by reason of injury received in the execution of their duty;
(iv) of pensions to and in respect of persons who cease to be members of a police force on the ground of age; and
(v) of pensions in respect of persons who die while serving as members of police forces,
and may provide that where a person ceases to be a member of a police force in order to undertake compulsory national service, the period of his compulsory national service and such further period, if any, as may be specified in the regulations may be treated, in such manner, to such extent and on such conditions as to contributions or otherwise as may be so specified, as a period of service as a member of a police force.
(3) Regulations made under this section may contain such consequential or incidental provisions as appear to the Secretary of State to be necessary or expedient, including, in particular, provision as to the cases in which pensions are to be varied, suspended or terminated, or are to be applied otherwise than by being paid to the persons to whom they were awarded.
(4) Without prejudice to the generality of the preceding provisions of this section, regulations made under this section may contain such provision as appears to the Secretary of State to be necessary or expedient in relation to a person who transfers from or to service in a police force to or from other service or employment, whether in a police force or not, including provisions enabling that other service or employment to be reckoned in whole or in part as service in a police force and provisions authorising or requiring payments to be made by or to the person or into or out of the fund out of which a pension may become or might have become payable to or in respect of the person in question as a member of a police force, including payments of contributions, payments of transfer values, payments towards the burden of a pension payable by another person or out of another fund, or other payments directed to the creation or preservation of pension rights of the person in question.
(5) Regulations made under this section shall specify the persons by and to whom and the funds into or out of which pensions and contributions in respect of pension rights are to be payable, may provide for the establishment or continuance of special funds for the purpose, and, subject to the provisions of this subsection, may provide for payments of contributions or pensions, and such other payments as are mentioned in subsection (4) of this section, being made into the Exchequer or out of moneys provided by Parliament:
Provided that no regulations shall provide for payments into the Exchequer or out of moneys provided by Parliament except in relation to a person who is or has been such a person as is mentioned in subsection (1) of section one of the Police (Overseas Service) Act, 1945 , or any other person whose salary or remuneration is or was wholly or partly payable out of moneys provided by Parliament or who is or may become entitled to or eligible for a pension so payable, so, however, that regulations shall not be treated for the purpose of this proviso as providing for payments out of moneys provided by Parliament by reason only that, as a result of the making of the regulations, an increased sum may be payable out of moneys provided by way of a grant towards the expenses of a police force.
(6) Nothing in this section or in any regulations made thereunder shall affect any of the provisions of the National Insurance Act, 1946 , or the National Insurance (Industrial Injuries) Act, 1946 .
(7) Any power to make regulations under this section shall be exercisable by statutory instrument, and before any such instrument is made, a draft of the regulations shall be laid before each House of Parliament, and the instrument shall not be made until that draft has been approved by resolution of each House.
2 Protection of serving members.
(1) Any regulations made under section one of this Act shall be so framed as to ensure—
(a ) that the times at which an existing member of a police force is or may be required under those regulations to retire on the ground of age do not, unless he at any time elects otherwise, differ from those which would have been applicable in his case if those regulations had not come into force; and
(b ) that the scale of pensions payable under those regulations to an existing member of a police force who ceases to be a member of that police force either—
(i) after having served for any period prescribed by those regulations; or
(ii) by reason of infirmity of mind or body after having served for any shorter period so prescribed, not being infirmity due to injury received in the execution of his duty,
is not, unless he elects otherwise within such time and in such manner as may be prescribed in those regulations, less favourable than the scale applicable in his case immediately before the coming into force of those regulations.
In this subsection, the expression ‘existing member,’ in relation to any police force, means a person who is serving in that police force at the date when the regulations in question come into force.
(2) Regulations made under the said section one shall not be invalid by reason that in fact they do not secure the results specified in the preceding subsection, but if the Secretary of State is satisfied, or it is held by the High Court or by the Court of Session, that any such regulations have failed to secure those results, the Secretary of State shall so soon as may be make under the said section one the necessary amending regulations, and any such amending regulations shall have effect as from the date of the coming into force of the regulations which they amend.
3 Application of regulations.
(1) Subject to the provisions of the last preceding section and of this subsection, any regulations made under section one of this Act may be so framed as to apply in relation to persons who, at the date when the regulations come into force are, or thereafter become, members of any police force, and also so as to apply to pensions granted on the death of a person who had ceased to be a member of a police force before the said date, where the death occurs on or after the said date and also so as to authorise or require the payment of pensions or increased pensions to widows and children of persons dying before the said date (whether before or after the passing of this Act) where the deceased had been a member of a police force and, in the case of a widow, where the marriage was in existence when he ceased (whether on death or otherwise) to be a member thereof:
Provided that nothing in any such regulations shall—
(a ) affect any pension granted on the retirement of any person if the retirement occurred before the said date, notwithstanding that that person is on the said date, or thereafter becomes, again a member of a police force; or
(b ) affect any pension granted by virtue of subsection (3) of section four of the Police and Firemen (War Service) Act, 1939 , if the expiration of the period (or last period, if more than one) which, by virtue of subsection (1) of section two of that Act, is treated as a period of approved service in the case of the person in question is before the date of the coming into force of the first regulations so made as aforesaid; or
(c ) apply to any pension to or in respect of a person to whom the National Fire Service (Preservation of Pensions) (Police Firemen) Regulations, 1941, apply; or
(d ) apply to any pension to any person who, having formerly been a member of a police force, is at the date of the coming into force of the first regulations so made as aforesaid serving in any capacity mentioned in paragraph (i) of subsection (1) of section ten of the Police Pensions Act, 1921 , and does not thereafter again become a member of a police force;
and the...
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