For the last few years, the coalition government, under the watchful eye of Lib Dem pensions minister Steve Webb, has been slowly and unspectacularly taking forward Labour’s plan – developed with the support of all parties, and both the trade union movement and the Confederation of British Industry – for automatic enrolment into a workplace…
In his Budget 2011 speech, George Osborne promised to herald a ‘march of the makers’ – to absolutely no avail. He made a similar claim in his Budget 2014 speech, as manufacturing again featured heavily among the measures announced. Once bitten, twice shy: stagnating pay in manufacturing, as the numbers employed in the sector plummets,…
The Conservative Party’s general election manifesto could not have been clearer: A sustainable recovery must be driven by growth in exports’. A preceding speech by George Osborne specified ‘net exports’, explaining that rising exports had to be matched by falling imports, as Britain once again became a nation of ‘makers’ rather than simply consumers. Yet…
There is much to welcome in the results of the Office of Fair Trading’s market study into workplace pensions. They suggest (I would not class them as recommendations given they have simply identified problems and asked DWP to consult on them) more action on high charges in ‘legacy’ schemes, built-in adviser commissions that would be…
The TUC has today published the 2013 edition of PensionsWatch. Anyone familiar with previous editions in this series (which began in 2003, looking at directors’ pensions in FTSE 100 companies) will find its main results depressingly well-rehearsed, although alarming nonetheless. However, this year’s report documents evidence that not only are directors of the UK’s biggest…
The Pensions Bill currently being considered by parliament will accelerate the timetable for increasing state pension age (SPA) to 67. It will now reach 67 for both men and women by 2028, compared to 2036 under current legislation. The TUC has long argued that it is grossly unfair to increase SPA – and certainly to…
The good news is that the Bank of England, under new governor Mark Carney, has demonstrated it cares about unemployment. Its ‘forward guidance’, published yesterday, means monetary policy, which is being used as an economic stimulus, will stay as it is until unemployment starts to come down. The bad news, however, is that we are…
Earlier this week the Pensions Policy Institute (PPI) published ‘Tax relief for pension saving in the UK’, its report into pensions tax relief and in particular the effectiveness of tax breaks as an incentive to save. Even as someone who has been working on pensions issues for several years, I was genuinely shocked by some…
Back in April the Work and Pensions select committee recommended a single regulator for workplace pensions, following severe criticism of the Financial Services Authority (now the Financial Conduct Authority), one half of the dual regulatory structure, alongside the Pensions Regulator. I blogged about the issue here at the time. The government has now responded –…
The quickfire nature of the evidence sessions at the Pensions Bill’s committee stages meant I was unable to highlight, when appearing before MPs yesterday, what I think is one of the main problems with the government’s proposals. Because the ‘single tier’ state pension is being introduced at a time when male and female state pension…