Barclays has not had an “easy ride” over a deal which has led to it reducing its contributions to its pension scheme, despite the deficit increasing by £1.9bn, the scheme’s chairman has said.

In its interim results, published last month, the bank revealed the deficit of its UK Retirement Fund, which is its main fund, had reached £7.9bn at 30 September 2016, compared to £6bn at 30 September 2015. Its triennial valuation revealed a funding level of 81.5 per cent.

Despite this, Barclay’s interim report also revealed the trustee had agreed for the bank to cut promised payments of £1.3bn over the next four years. Originally, it had pledged contributions of £1.24bn and then three payments of £740m up to 2020. However, these have been cut to £740m, and then three payments of £500m.

According to The Times the chairman of the pension scheme, Peter Goshawk, said the 248,000 members are protected as a result of the arrangement, under which up to £9bn of Barclays assets could be seized if it failed to meet promises.

In addition, he also stated the bank did not get off easy: “I can assure you that by no means has the bank had an easy ride through this...we have an extraordinary robust set of trustees.”

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