The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has postponed setting new statutory deadlines for delivering the McCloud remedy for the NHS Pension Scheme to ensure timings are ‘realistic’.

In a written statement, Minister of State for Health (Secondary Care), Karin Smyth, said implementing the remedy in NHS Pension Scheme was a hugely complex undertaking.

The department asked the NHS Business Services Authority (NHSBSA), as the scheme’s administrator, to prioritise delivering the remedy for around 49,000 retired members who were likely to receive higher benefits following their McCloud choice.

By 24 June, statements to enable McCloud choices had been sent to 13,982 of these members, while the remainder are expected to receive their statements by December 2027.

In early 2025, the government confirmed a delay in the production of NHS Pension Scheme remedial service statements (RSS).

Smyth published a statement in May 2026 saying that she expected dependencies, such as procuring external suppliers to supplement the NHSBSA’s capacity and the release of software to automate statement production, to progress sufficiently to be able to set new statutory deadlines for the issuance of RSS before the summer recess.

While progress has been made in maturing these dependencies, Smyth has concluded that further time is needed to reduce the uncertainty in the plan timing to a level she is “comfortable in setting new statutory deadlines”.

“When the current work is sufficiently progressed I will set new RSS deadlines that are realistic, achievable and protect delivery of normal pension service operations which continue to run in parallel to remedy activity,” Smyth stated.

“Irrespective of when new deadlines are set, delivering the McCloud remedy remains a priority, particularly for those members who are likely to be facing financial detriment.

“The NHSBSA continues to issue remediable service statements and remedial pension saving statements to scheme members affected by McCloud in line with the delivery schedule that I set out in May.”

Quilter NHS pensions expert, Graham Crossley, commented: "The decision to delay setting new statutory deadlines until there is greater certainty around delivery capacity and system automation is understandable.

“While members will inevitably be disappointed by further delays, there is little value in establishing ambitious deadlines only for them to be missed later. Realistic and achievable targets ultimately provide greater confidence for affected scheme members.

"However, delays continue to have genuine consequences for those awaiting completion of their remedy.

“For some members this means continued financial detriment where they may be entitled to higher pension benefits, while for others the passage of time creates additional complexity as circumstances change through retirement, partial retirement, bereavement or wider tax planning decisions.”

The McCloud ruling relates to changes in 2015 that saw older members being able to stay in the existing and better pension scheme, while younger members had to transfer to a new and worse scheme, which was ruled as discriminatory on the grounds of age.

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