Councils have urged chancellor, George Osborne, to reconsider controversial plans to increase staff pension contributions, amid fears it would be viewed as a pay cut and could lead to an exodus from town hall pension schemes, as revealed in The MJ (3 February).

The Local Government Group has called for urgent meetings between the Government, council employers and trade unions ‘to discuss how to achieve the Government's aims' for pensions reform, in advance of the final report by the Independent Public Service Pensions Commission.