Bethan Jenkins AC/AM South Wales West

Visteon pensioners protesting outside the Assembly in January

INDUSTRIAL disputes often have a habit of tipping over into tragedy. Many people in Wales will remember the death of David Wilkie, the Treforest taxi driver killed near Rhymney when a piece of concrete was dropped on his car while it was carrying strike breaker David Williams to work during the 1984 mining dispute.

Now, the 3,500 former Visteon workers – including 700 from Swansea - fighting to have their pensions restored following the collapse of the car parts maker last year, are claiming that the near-year-long battle has claimed its first victim. Colin Nicholls, who worked at the company’s Basildon site, passed away on February 14 following an illness that his wife Janet says was not helped by the uncertainty over entitlements, which could result in staff that worked for up to 40 years for Ford – and then Visteon, when it was spun out of the auto-maker in 2000 – losing as much as half of what they were expecting to receive.

Now those pensioners are waiting for their union Unite to begin legal action against Ford after last-ditch talks in New York, where officials asked executives once again to make good on promises over pensions that staff believed were given when the spin-out occurred. After Visteon went bust on March 31 last year, its administrators applied to enter the Pension Protection Fund. The PPF, you may remember, was set up in the wake of the collapse of Allied Steel and Wire in 2002 (its pensioners, coincidentally, are still fighting for a full honouring of their entitlements).

Mrs Nicholls left this now-particularly poignant message on the Visteon Pension Action Group website in January: “I am writing this on behalf of my husband Colin Nicholls. He would not have changed over to Visteon if Ford had not said that they would support you all with your pensions. At the moment my husband is ill and cannot attend any of the meetings. If I was not at work myself I would be there for him as my father and brother worked for Fords for many years until they retired…. I am sure that this trouble with the loss of pensions has not helped my husband. What we are losing each month is a considerable amount but not as much as some but still a lot to worry about. I blame Ford for the way my husband has gone down and I will support you as much as I can even if my husband cannot. Good luck to you all.”

To add insult to injury, Mrs Nicholls says she was telephoned on the day of her husband’s funeral by Visteon’s administrators. She had already learned she was no longer entitled to the death benefit normally paid to Ford and Visteon workers because the Visteon UK pension fund had entered the PPF assessment process. She has told VPAG: “(I was) phoned that same day saying that I have got to pay back £720.00. I don’t know what this is for so am still waiting for their letter. The man who phoned knew the funeral was on that day. It was annoying but I kept my cool and will wait to see what they have to say.”

Visteon pensioners have been told that they must repay a cap of 10% to 50% (the amount levied on their pensions when they enter the PPF proper, which should have been administered on their pension payments between March and November 2009). Although this money was asked to be repaid over six months, the large sums involved will virtually wipe out a number of pensioners’ monthly payments. But while VPAG has succeeded in negotiating longer periods of repayments with the pension fund administrators, Mrs Nicholls has been told to repay the outstanding amount immediately because her husband has died. Beyond that, she will only be left with half of what the PPF agrees to give her.

Apart from the legal action, there are signs that the pensions regulator is getting tougher over ‘dumped funds’. But at present, the PPF still provides the most likely outcome for most Visteon pensioners, and it is prevented by the rules under which it was brought into being from paying in full the entitlements of those that have entered the fund. In the meantime, the Swansea pensioners will be marching to a rally at Westminster to mark the first anniversary of Visteon going to the wall. It may have been a year, but this battle is far from over, and these men and women deserve our support.

- This piece can also be seen on WalesHome.org