PARLIAMENT | The restructuring of the pension scheme for civil servants will only involve newly appointed officers and not existing pensioners.

Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Mohamed Farid Md Rafik said the government assured that all forms of restructuring and study on retirement benefits and pension schemes for civil servants would not affect the existing retirement benefits and facilities, despite the government's financial constraints.

"As of October 2018, the government had a total of 824,235 pension recipients with total expenditure for the 10 months of this year alone, amounting to RM24 billion.

"If the restructured pension scheme is implemented, it will involve only newly appointed officers, and will not affect civil servants who have been receiving pensions and benefits," he told the Dewan Negara.

He was replying to senator Jamilah Sulaiman, who wanted to know if the government was restructuring the pension scheme for government servants.

Farid said the restructuring study had not yet been concluded, but the government was always open to accepting proposals to find the best formula in dealing with matters involving the welfare of civil servants.

To Jamilah's supplementary question on the expected period of the study, he said the government was conducting a study to upgrade the civil service, while restructuring of the pension scheme would take about two years to complete from 2019.

- Bernama