GUERNSEY Electricity’s employees’ pension fund took a £5.8m. hit last year, it has been confirmed.

The States-owned utility has ploughed £400,000 into the fund to help with the deficit.

It was the last instalment after the board decided in 2005 to contribute £2m. over five years towards the fund when it began to shrink.

Guernsey Electricity was left frustrated last week when it announced losses of £834,000 for the year ending 31 March.

It has urged the regulator to increase prices, warning that a failure to do so could leave the utility unable to carry out planned capital projects on infrastructure.

Managing director Ian Watson said that GE employees were part of the same pension fund as all States workers.

He said the utility had its own ring-fenced section of the Superannuation Fund but the States managed it. ‘It is the big States of Guernsey pot and we are just part of it,’ he said.

The value of Guernsey Electricity’s pension fund totalled £28.6m. on 31 March.