Note by United Nations Participants’ Representatives
to the Pension Board
Composition of
the Board
2019
|
Background
1)
The current
size
and composition of the
Pension Board was established
in 1987 via resolution 42/222 when the General
Assembly authorized 33 seats
based on a tripartite structure. This resolution
took effect on
1 January 1989 as promulgated.
2)
In
2002 the GA in resolution
57/286 requested the Pension Board to review its
size
and composition
“with a view to making such representation
more equitable in order
to reflect the
actual distribution of active participants in
the Fund, present and future trends in Fund participation,”
3) In 2006 after considering the report of
the Pension Board’s Working Group on Size and Composition of the Board[1],
the General Assembly noted that
“in this regard that the Board recognized that its decision to retain the current size
of the Board, and its composition and allocation of seats
did not fully respond
to General Assembly resolution
57/286 regarding the size and composition of the United Nations Joint Staff
Pension Board to achieve fairer representation;
4) In 2018 after noting the findings and
recommendations in OIOS audit on Governance of the Fund A/73/341[2],
the GA noted in paragraph 14 that the
Board would be considering the following:
(b) The composition and size of the Board, including
the role of retiree representatives and the modalities for directly electing
retiree representatives to the Board;
(c) Allocation of seats on the Board;
(d) Implementation of a review and rotation scheme for
the adjustment of the composition of the Board on a regular basis, to allow
eligible member organizations to share rotating seats in a fair and equitable
manner;
(e)
A regular review mechanism for the adjustment of the composition of the Board;
5)
Furthermore
in paragraph 44 of 73/274 the where the GA highlighted:
[Highlights the
importance attached by the General Assembly to continuing to ensure unfaltering accountability by the Pension Board, and requests the Board to provide detailed follow-up on all aspects of the implementation of the present resolution, including information on the implementation of the recommendations of the Office of Internal Oversight Services agreed to by the Board, in the context of its report to be submitted at the seventy-fourth session of the Assembly. [Emphasis added]
Review of composition,
allocation, and role of retirees
6)
UN
participants’ representatives have considered the request of the General
Assembly vis a vis paragraph 14 of
73/274, have reviewed the audit and critical OIOS recommendations in this area,
and re-read the 2006 report of the Working Group on composition, and recall our
position as provided in 2018[3].JSPB/65/R.46
Retirees – role and
allocation of seats
7)
Retirees make up approximately 55,500 of the
beneficiary populations; FAFICS is a federation of several Associations of
Former International Civil Servants (AFICS) whose membership comprise about
19,500 or 35 percent of retirees and 25% of beneficiaries of the Fund.
8)
OIOS has found that on average, comparator
Pension Funds have seven (7) representatives of active participants to one (1) retiree
representative. They also observed that the fact that FAFICS was represented by
two individuals at each working group and Committee, making it by far the most
represented group on the Board.
9)
We have also reviewed prior requests by FAFICS
in 2000, the 2006 Report of the Working Group where that group considered the
process for direct election of retirees and the May 2007 Study on Possible Process for the Election of
Retirees’ Representatives and current proposals to the Governance
Working Group to increase the number of their members attending meetings from
six to eight. UN Participants’ representatives
cannot support the FAFICS proposal increase the number of what started out as a
temporary solution.
10) In
its resolution 61/240 the General Assembly took note of the decision of the
Board to share the costs of two (2) retiree representatives to attend the
Board. The GA also noted that this was supposed to be a temporary arrangement
to be ended around 2008, when it was expected that retirees would be seated on
the Board and their representatives would be chosen through direct election.
11) In 2018, a group of retirees sent a letter to
OIOS which indicated that they were concerned that retirees’ interests were not
always represented by FAFICS – pointing to the lack of FAFICS support for an
audit of the backlog - and requested direct elections of their representatives
on the Board.
12) UN Participants’ Representatives reiterate
our position and propose that retirees could elect one representative (and one
alternate) via a democratic direct election.
Principles
13) The proposal fulfills all the needs of each
constituency and embodies the principle that participants, retirees, member
organizations and governing bodies, each have a stakeholder (shareholder /
sponsor) interest in the viability of the Fund:
a)
Maintain a 33 member tripartite board (GA)
b)
Calculable, fair and equitable representation
that is based on the number of active participants of all organizations of the
fund. (GA, OIOS)
c)
One seat (plus one alternate) on the Board for one
representative democratically elected by retirees of the Fund[4].
(Retirees requests, OIOS, GA and in keeping with the current caucus)
d)
A 1 % threshold for voting seat on the Board (JSPB/52/R31
–Working Group 2004)
e)
A rotation schedule that ensures the equity of
organizations meeting and surpassing the threshold (GA)
f)
Periodic review (a year or two prior to the end
of rotation) which will act as a mechanism to adjust for changes in proportion
of active participants and of member organizations attaining or falling below
the 1% threshold (GA).
g)
Inclusion of all member organizations
through attendance at meetings of the Board (Rule A.9).
h)
Federation status for FAFICS, similar to CCISUA,
FICSA and UNISERV (1 observer and 1 alternate each).
Details of proposal
14) Currently the Board
is divided into six Groups. The
proposed composition would
have five groups as follows using statistics reported as at
31 December 2017:
a.
Group I,
consisting of the United
Nations representatives
will be increased to 21 members to correspond with 85,009 (67.1%) sixty-seven point 1 % of active participants as a 31/12/2017
equivalent of 22 members rounded down to 21 to maintain a tripartite nature; 1
representative from the participants’ group would be elected by retirees.
b.
Group II made up
of FAO and
WHO
SPCs with a total of 21,265 (16.8%)
active participants continues
to have a total of 6 members –(3 each)
c.
Group III currently consists
of IAEA, ILO and
UNESCO
with a total of 8,799 which is equivalent to approximately seven (7) percent of active participants.
i. The proposed Group III would be comprised of the representatives
of member organizations
with over two (2) percent of participants IAEA, ILO and IOM totaling 11,360 participants or nine
(9) percent of total participants in the Fund
d.
The proposed Group IV – UNESCO,
ICAO, ITU, UNIDO and
WIPO, ICC
with a total of 7,003 participants five percent (5%) of
active participants. The proposed Group IV will share 3 seats - they each have
between 1% and 2% of participants and total.
e.
The proposed
Group V would comprise the remaining SPCs
which have not attained the
1% threshold. These are IFAD, IMO, WMO, EPPO, ICCROM, ICGEB, IPU, ISA, ITLOS, WTO-Tourism, and
STL, which combined employ 2,099 participants as
at 31/12/2017. This group will not have
representatives on the Board but will attend and participate in Board meetings
in accordance with Rule of Procedure A.9 (d)
The
attached Annex I details the composition and calculations
Rotation Schedule
15) In order
to attain the equitable representation a rotation schedule will be implemented.
a) Groups
I and II will continue to be represented by each constituency Governing Bodies,
Executive Heads and Participants (and Retirees), at each Board meeting.
b) Group
III will be composed of 3 members (1from each constituency) and each
organization will send one voting member to the Board meeting as per the
rotation schedule.
c) Group
IV will be comprised of 3 members with each organization having .5 seat.
16) It will take 6 years for each organization in
this group to have sent one member from each constituency to the Board. Therefore a complete rotation will be created
for 6 years. (Annex II)
Mechanism for regular review and adjustment
of the composition
17) The
rotation schedule will be reviewed 2 years prior to the completion of the
schedule so that there will be enough time to prepare for changes to the
schedule.
18) A Working
Group of Board members could be re-established for this purpose.
19) In view of the
time which
has passed from the first
of five GA resolutions, the
recent critical recommendation from OIOS in the Audit
of Governance, and GA RES/73/264, the may wish to endorse this proposal and to
adopt the necessary amendments to Article 5 and Article 6 of the Fund’s
Regulations to give it effect.
No comments:
Post a Comment