Crossword Genius

Nervous tension as maladmin­istered pension claimed by workers (4,2,4,5)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

ants in ones pants

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'nervous tension as maladministered' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't judge whether it can be defined by this definition.

'pension claimed by workers' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite see how this works, but
an anagram of 'pension' is 'inonesp' which is present in the answer.
'workers' could be 'ants' (worker ants) and 'ants' is located in the answer.
The remaining letters 'ants' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't understand.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

Can you help me to learn more?

I've seen this clue in The Guardian.
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