barstewards
You are still confusing profit with spare cash. The regulator has allowed NATS to make that profit only to fund the investment programme. If you work in NERL in the South you are sitting in front of that profit everytime you go to work, if you work in Scotland you have to look across the car park to see it. If that profit is not invested the regulator will quickly step in and either make NATS invest it or reduce charges by that amount. Those sums of money can not be used to fund your pension or any other normal running cost.
Did NATS pay off the shareholder loans with cash ? If you read the NERL accounts as well as the NATS ones I think you'll find that it's really re-financed that loan. That's good business sense, why pay 12.5% when most of your borrowing is between 5 and 8%, but the company is not significantly richer as a result. Why the emphasis on "EARLY" ? My credit card balance doesn't have to be paid off every month but I'd be stupid if I left the balance there when I could pay it off.
£120 million is a lot of money and it seems to me that it would be very hard to hide that amount in the accounts but I haven't been able to find it, perhaps you can.
You may be able to find the money year on year to fund the pension at 40% underlying rate but unless the regulator agrees to pass through those costs I can't and neither could the experts that NTUS consulted.