Pension speculation

USS pension funds might be vulnerable not only to the Treasury but also to European Union tax and financial harmonisation plans.

Britain has invested more than twice the amount in pension funds as the rest of the EU put together. With financial (not merely currency) union, pension funds might have to be put into a common EU pool and USS members might lose much more than that removed by the Treasury.

Members of the USS would do well to ponder the advantages of monetary rather than currency union with the EU.

Nigel T. James Quondam senior lecturer Sheffield University