Pensions Authority

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Photo of Aoife Malone

The Minister for Social Protection, Leo Varadkar, has this week published the General Scheme of the Social Welfare and Pensions Bill 2017. The General Scheme is an initial draft of a bill which is then subject to pre-legislative scrutiny before being finalised. While in the normal course it could take some months for a General Scheme to be reviewed and scrutinized, the Minister has indicated that he intends for the final bill to be enacted before the Dáil breaks for Summer Recess (normally towards the end of July).

Key points:

  • Sponsoring employers to be required to give 12 months’ notice before ceasing contributions to defined benefit pension schemes and to continue paying contributions to the scheme during that period;
  • Employers of schemes which do not satisfy the minimum funding standard / funding standard reserve, to be required to enter into funding negotiations with the trustees;
  • Proposed power for the Pensions Authority to impose contribution obligation on sponsoring employers; and
  • Extension of spouse’s pensions to civil partners and same-sex spouses in certain circumstances.

Continue Reading General Scheme of the Social Welfare and Pensions Bill 2017: statutory notice periods, debt on the employer and implications for scheme funding

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Since June 2012, under the Occupational Pension Schemes (Disclosure of Information) Regulations 2006, trustees of schemes which are subject to the statutory funding standard are required to submit an Annual Actuarial Data Return each year. Details of the Return are set out in the Disclosure Regulations which must be completed by the scheme actuary and submitted to the Pensions Authority within 9 months of the end of the scheme year.

In the period up to 31 March 2016, the Pensions Authority received 699 Returns and has now published a summary of the information. A copy of the summary is available here. Points of particular interest include:Continue Reading Pensions Authority releases statistics for defined benefit schemes

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At the Irish Association of Pension Funds Annual Investment Conference held last week, Brendan Kennedy, the Pensions Regulator, reiterated the Pensions Authority’s continued focus on good governance and its plans for ramping up the Authority’s programme of engagement with trustees of defined benefit schemes. This engagement includes continuing to invite such trustees to meet with…

Photo of Aoife Malone

As part of its remit, the Pensions Authority is responsible for the monitoring and supervision of, and the issuing of guidelines or guidance notes on, the operation of the Pensions Act. One of the key objectives of the Pensions Authority for 2016 and the coming years is to provide further guidance for trustees of occupational pension schemes.

At a Pensions Authority Seminar in January, the first tranche of the Authority’s Codes of Governance for Defined Contribution Schemes were launched with the second tranche released this week. There are currently six codes available here covering the following topics:

  1. Governance plan of action;
  2. Trustee meetings;
  3. Managing conflicts of interest;
  4. Collection and remittance of contributions;
  5. Investing scheme assets; and
  6. Paying benefits.

Continue Reading Pensions Authority Codes of Governance for Defined Contribution Pension Schemes

Photo of David Francis

Where a scheme is operated on an integrated basis, it reduces the pension entitlements of members to account for their State pension. A bridging pension is a supplemental pension which is sometimes paid to members who retire before the age at which the State pension is payable. Schemes may also reduce the contributions payable by…

Photo of Chris Comerford

The funding difficulties facing defined benefit schemes in this country at the moment as well as the strengthening of the Pensions Act funding requirements and re-introduction of funding standard deadlines has seen both scheme sponsors and trustees adopt an increasingly more creative approach to satisfying statutory obligations as well as providing a sustainable basis for funding.  This might include putting in place security in favour of the trustees of the scheme, swapping equity for a scheme deficit (see, for example, the deal struck by UK company, Uniq with the trustees of its pension scheme in 2011 and the recent arrangement proposed by Independent News and Media Group to the trustees of its scheme where the scheme appears to have been offered a 5% equity stake in the IN&M Group as part of a broader deal around restructuring), revising the funding obligation or providing an unsecured parent company guarantee.
Continue Reading Creative DB scheme funding approaches – contingent assets and unsecured undertakings

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After much talk over the past 2 or 3 years, at last sovereign annuities have become a reality… nearly.  This week, I was one of the speakers at the launch of the first sovereign annuity approved by the Pensions Board.  Getting to this point is a major milestone in the long journey towards being able to use sovereign annuities. We are not quite there yet though.

One of the speakers at the launch was Anthony Linehan of the National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA). The view in the industry is that sovereign annuities are most likely to be backed by Irish sovereign bonds. Mr Linehan gave a very interesting presentation on the bonds which the State will issue to back sovereign annuities and the process for issuing and pricing those bonds.

It seems that the State will issue what are being called ‘amortising bonds’. These are bonds which will pay out equal annual payments which are made up of a coupon payment and part of the principal which would usually be repaid at the expiry of the bond.  They are ideally suited to sovereign annuities.Continue Reading Sovereign Annuities – Nearly a Reality

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The Pensions Board’s deadline for the submission of responses to its consultation on the simplification of defined contribution pension provision passed at the end of February.  The consultation sought views on a number of different issues. These ranged from the number of different pension vehicles to pension adjustment orders to disclosure requirements.

A&L Goodbody have…

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The Pensions Board has recently confirmed that they will monitor trustee training compliance on an ongoing basis. Trustees are required to record in the scheme’s annual report that they have received the appropriate training as required by the Pensions Act and within the specified time limits.

Trustees will be interested to note that the Pensions…