The Ministry of Social Affairs is looking for ways to bring old pension plans into line with pensions offered to more recently retired government workers.

Minister Vong Sauth said at a meeting on Wednesday there was a gap between pensions for those who had retired in previous years and those who had retired more recently.

He said that the gap was due to the Kingdom having had different pension programs in the past. But adjusting the pensions of older retirees to match those of newer retirees would be difficult.

“We need time because we will need a large budget for that,” he said. Roeun Rithyroath, the bureaucrat in charge of pensions at the ministry, declined to reveal figures on older pension plans versus newer plans. He also declined to say how much money would be needed to adjust the lower pensions.

“We cannot answer, unless we get permission,” he said in a message. “This is the ministry’s policy.”

San Chey, executive director of accountability watchdog ANSA-EAP, said his organisation welcomed equity in pensions as they had differed “from year to year”.

“It will be helpful, but currently we still see issues with corruption and mismanagement of the national budget,” he said.

The national budget would increase if the government tackled those two issues and improved its tax collection, he added.