LAST WEEK Ben Lake MP raised in Parliament the cases of his constituents who have been caught up by the ongoing mismanagement of the Civil Service Pension Scheme by Capita.
In a question to Cabinet Office minister and Paymaster General, Mr Nick Thomas Symonds MP during a government statement on the ongoing failings, Ben Lake MP explained that a constituent was still waiting for a pension quote after submitting a request for it just over a year before their retirement date.
In December 2025, Capita took over the administration of the Civil Service Pension Scheme. Within four weeks, having already faced troubled service under the previous provider MyCSP, the scheme was dealing with a crisis of mispayments, delayed quotes and lost data. Throughout 2025, both the National Audit Office and the Public Accounts Committee explicitly flagged that Capita was missing critical transition milestones and IT delivery targets, yet despite these clear red flags, the Cabinet Office chose to override significant warnings and accepted flawed assurances.
On January 28, the Cabinet Office announced an urgent recovery plan with a team of civil servants led by HMRC permanent secretary Angela MacDonald. Initial data suggested 8,500 retired civil servants had not received payments, and that there were 6,300 open bereavement-related cases.
Soon after the recovery plan was launched, Capita pledged it would hit standard contractual levels for all cases by the end of June.
As of the end of June, there are still more than 6,700 quotations outstanding for past retirement dates, and more than 4,100 bereavement cases on which Capita could take action. These cases include the most harrowing stories that are currently affecting devastated scheme members and grieving families.
Cabinet Office minister and Paymaster General Nick Thomas Symonds told the House of Commons on Monday that Capita’s contract was a “prime candidate” to be brought back under Government management but ruled out the move in the immediate future. Amidst period of political uncertainty surrounding the Prime Minister, the Government must honour their 2024 manifesto pledge to bring the scheme in house in the long term. An emerging worry among unions is the number of civil servants who are putting off retirement plans until the crisis is sorted. Looking beyond those currently close to retirement, there may be an impact on mid-career civil servants due to there being no working retirement modeller since December.
Ben Lake MP said: “It is little wonder that the June deadline for hitting standard contractual levels for all cases has been missed. Although the government has allocated significant resource and staff to help eradicate the backlog, Capita should not be left off the hook.
“The backlog is the company’s responsibility to resolve, and it should be allocating additional staff and resources towards the endeavour.
“I acknowledge the steps that the government has taken to try and resolve this matter, but the fact that 140 civil servants have been sent to sort out Capita’s mess exposes the folly of outsourcing the pension in the first place.
“Public servants who have dedicated their working lives to this country deserve financial security and dignity in retirement, not corporate failure caused by severe administrative mismanagement.
“The priority must be to resolve the backlog of pension claims before the August deadline, but the government should also ensure that every penny of taxpayer’s money that has been spent to resolve Capita’s mess is recuperated and work apace to return the management of this pension scheme to the public sector.”
