STEP 1

In this first step, you will read carefully the presentation of this unit (phrasal verbs have been highlighted in yellow). A full glossary below will help you understand it better. To get information in Spanish, just place the arrow of your mouse on any highlighted word without clicking.

A pension is money paid to an employee when he retires. In Britain there is a compulsory scheme in which the employee pays a fixed amount every week and the employer a larger amount. Then on retirement, the worker gets his state pension.
Nowadays, however, an increasing number of companies operate their own pension schemes to give their employees more money to retire on. These schemes are usually governed by a trust deed. The trust is separate from the company. Trustees are appointed and they hold meetings regularly to approve money for pensions, examine the fund accounts and so on. Every employee working for Harper & Grant, for example, pays a certain amount of his wages into the fund. This money is invested to increase its value, and after a certain period of employment the employee qualifies for a pension.
As a result of the productivity drive, Mr. Grant wants to close down unprofitable departments. Nearly all the redundant workers have been absorbed into other departments, but there is one, Bob Hardiman, who, Mr. Grant says, will have to go. He is a craftsman in the old style, that is, he is a carpenter able to do fine hand-carving, which is now hardly ever required. Ian Hampden, the Personnel Manager, thinks that Mr. Grant is wrong to get rid of someone who has been with the firm so many years. He tries to make Mr. Grant change his mind. Mr. Grant, however, is determined on his new plans to streamline the company, and make it more profitable and competitive. Ian goes to see Peter to find out if he can suggest a way of persuading Mr. Grant to see reason.
The pension fund meeting is due to be held shortly, and Bob Hardiman's pension will have to be approved. Peter remembers that a few years ago Bob Hardiman had to leave the company to look after his father, who had become an invalid. When his father died, Bob Hardiman rejoined the company. Peter realises at once that according to the articles of the trust, if an employee leaves the firm for a time he must then work a certain number of years in order to qualify for the full pension. Bob Hardiman has not yet completed this time. He has, in fact, three more years to go. If he is sacked now and not given his full pension it will have an extremely bad effect on everybody, since he has been with the firm so long.
Peter, at the meeting, cunningly suggests that the company makes up the difference. In other words, that the company pays Bob Hardiman the money to make up his pension from the fund to the full amount that it would have been if he had not interrupted his employment. Peter is shrewd enough to know that Mr. Grant will not want to do this and may perhaps decide that the lesser of the two evils is to let the man stay on until his proper retirement age.

GLOSSARY:
pension: a regular payment to a person that is intended to allow them to subsist without working (pensión, jubilación);
to retire: to stop working on reaching a certain age (retirarse, jubilarse);
compulsory scheme: a mandatory plan (plan obligatorio);
on retirement: at the moment when he/she retires (al jubilarse);
to govern: to rule (regir);
trust deed: a written instrument legally conveying property to a trustee (fideicomisario) often used to secure an obligation such as a mortgage or promissory note (escritura de fondo fiduciario).
trustee: a person (or institution) to whom legal title to property is entrusted to use for another's benefit (fideicomisario);
fund: a reserve of money set aside for some purpose (fondo);
to qualify for a pension: to have the right to receive a pension (tener derecho a una pensión);
to close down: to cease to operate (cerrar definitivamente);
unprofitable: producing little or no profit or gain (poco o nada rentable);
redundant (innecesario): when an employee's job becomes unnecessary to a company he becomes redundant. Redundancy, therefore, leads to dismissal, premature retirement or transfer to another department;
craftsman: a worker whose job involves great skill in the manual arts (artesano);
hand-carving: engraving by hand (tallado a mano);
to get rid of: to remove (sacarse de encima a);
to find out: to search, to investigate (averiguar);
is due to be held shortly: will soon take place (tendrá lugar dentro de poco);
to look after: to take care of (para cuidar);
at once: immediately (enseguida, de inmediato);
articles (artículos): in the case, the legally registered rules of the Trust, the most important of which will deal with the qualifications for membership and how long an employee must work to be entitled to a full pension, and with all the possible variations that could arise, including how the amount of the pension is calculated ;
to sack: to dismiss, to fire (despedir);
cunningly: trickily (astutamente, maliciosamente);
to make up: to compensate (compensar);
shrewd: astute (astuto);
the lesser of the two evils: the evil of less importance (el menor de los dos males).