AMID plenary budget deliberations on Tuesday, the House of Representatives under the leadership of Speaker Ferdinand Martin Romualdez approved on second reading House Bill (HB) 8969 or the proposed “Military and Uniformed Personnel (MUP) Pension System Act.”
The measure seeks to ensure the sustainability of the pension and other benefits of MUP by creating a fiscal framework that fully supports its funding requirements. HB 8969 sets the mandatory retirement age of MUP at 57 years old.
The bill also provides for the automatic indexation of pension and survivorship benefits for MUP and their qualified survivors to adjustments in the salary of MUPs in active service holding the same rank.
The indexation would be subject to the following: 1) maximum 50 percent indexation of pension and survivorship benefits to the increases in the base pay of active MUP; 2) a fixed three percent annual increase in the base pay of active MUP for 10 years; and 3) authorization to lower the adjustment in the pension and survivorship benefits under unmanageable public sector deficit.
Under this bill, there would also be the creation of two separate trust funds: 1) Armed Forces of the Philippines Trust Fund and 2) Uniformed Personnel Trust Fund.
Deputy Speaker Kristine Singson-Meehan presided over the plenary session.
