A PUBLIC meeting to discuss the future of Visteon pensions is being held tonight.

The meeting at St Ignatius Rugby Club, in Donkey Lane, Enfield, starts at 7.30pm.

Pensioners and employees who had been paying into the company pension scheme before Visteon UK went into administration in March, face losing up to 50 per cent of their pensions.

The car parts manufacturer had a plant in Morson Road, Ponders End, as well as Basildon and Belfast.

When it went into administration, its pension fund was £250 million in deficit.

Former Ponders End employee, Linda Bartle worked for Ford for 12 years and Visteon for nine and at 57 is entitled to draw on her pension under the Visteon scheme.

She said when Ford created Visteon in 2000 most employees wanted to keep their money in the Ford pension fund but were told two years later this was illegal.

They were advised at the time that if they chose to freeze their pensions in the Ford fund rather than move their money into the Visteon fund they would lose out.

She added: "We were promised mirrored conditions for life. I think it's really bad, you work all your life and the next thing you hear the big boys have got all the bonuses and our money's gone. It's just like the banks."

American parent company Visteon Corporation initially denied responsibility for the redundant workers, but after seven weeks of protests, including occupying all three plants, it agreed to pay the redundancy package workers wanted.

However, the company pension scheme is now in the hands of the Government's Pension Protection Fund, which caps payments.

Pension-holders have been holding regular protests outside Ford dealership Dagenham Motors in Great Cambridge Road, Enfield, for the past fortnight.

The motor giant created Visteon from parts of its own manufacturing base in 2000 and many of the current pensioners spent most, if not all of their working lives, with the firm.