The Steam Packet’s pension deficit is over £10m.

The Council of Ministers was made aware of the deficit in December of 2017.

Accountancy firm KPMG advised a Park Partners report, on behalf of the Steam Packet’s former shareholders, that the company’s defined benefit schemes have aggregate deficits at the September 2017 balance sheet of £0.8m.

However that was indicated to rise by £10.1m, to £10.9m by March of this year when the new triennial valuations were produced. This included the company’s pension scheme, with a deficit of £10m, the Merchant Navy Ratings Pension Scheme which is a ’last man standing’ scheme, meaning all companies who have had people in the scheme remain liable until the last person in it dies.

Currently, the outstanding debt to the MNRP scheme is about £229,000, CoMin were told ’there is a risk ... that this may increase in the future’.

Officers of the Steam Packet are also in the Merchant Navy Officers Scheme which operates in the same way, as a last man standing scheme.

The outstanding deficit for this scheme was about £596,000 based on defined contributions, however again this is the potential this may rise, despite being closed to new members.