Contracting out
Following the changes to the State Pension from 6 April 2016, the Group's Defined Benefit (DB) pension schemes are no longer contracted out of the State Second Pension (S2P).
This means that from this date, National Insurance contributions for members of these DB schemes rose by 1.4% of band earnings per month.
The Group's National Insurance bill also increased by 3.4% of the band earnings for these members.
For more information on these changes, please see Changes to State Pension and contracting out.