Under Article 9 (2) of Annex VIII to the Staff Regulations of Officials, “The total number of officials and temporary servants, who retire without any reduction of their pension each year, shall not be higher than 10% of the officials in all institutions who retired the previous year.” The provision also foresees that “The annual percentage may vary from 8% to 12%, subject to a total of 20% over two years and the principle of budget neutrality.” However, the EU institutions have been allowing early retirement above those thresholds.
The General Affairs Council adopted, this week, conclusions on the Commission evaluation report on the implementation of the this early retirement measure. Whilst recalling “the long term budgetary burden of the early retirement measures”, the Council pointed out that the abovementioned thresholds “have been regularly fully exhausted” and “exceeded” during the 2004-2005 period.
Moreover, the Council noted that national governments are extending the length of working life in order to reduce pensions costs, consequently the EU institutions should be doing the same.
The Council called, therefore, on the EU institutions to limit the number of early retirement cases with full pension. Moreover, it called upon the Commission to present, next year, a legislative proposal repealing the abovementioned provision.
