The Pension Protection Fund is seeking to recover £75m from the administrators of Bernard Matthews, the Financial Times has reported.

In October administrators for Bernard Matthews estimated that the funding deficit in the company’s defined benefit pension scheme was around £20m.

However, the Pension Protection Fund, under a Section 75 debt claim, now seeks to retrieve £75m from Bernard Matthews’ administrators as a buyout deficit; the amount an insurer may charge in order to pay pensions in full and not at a PPF reduced rate.

The company was sold as a pre-pack by 2 SistersFood Group to Ranjit Boparan in September 2016, whereby Bernard Matthews’ assets, and not liabilities were given to the new owner. While 2,000 jobs were secured as part of the deal, 700 employees now suffer cuts to their pensions as a consequence of the scheme being passed into the PPF.

This latest development follows a report given to parliament in October warning that the Bernard Matthews deal was particularly constructed to benefit secured creditors and company controllers, ultimately disadvantaging the company’s pension scheme.

It is also reported by administrators Deloitte that the pension scheme has a secured debt of £17.5m, however, it won’t redeem any funds under this security, the Financial Times explained.

“In the case of the insolvency of an employer of a qualifying scheme, the PPF will always make a claim for the full Section 75 debt. This is standard practice as in many cases, at the time of insolvency, the amount of money that could be recovered is still unknown,” a PPF spokesperson said.

Bernard Matthews declined to comment until an official statement is made.

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