Programme
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Jonathan Stapleton, Editor-in-Chief, Professional Pensions
Charles Counsell, Chief Executive, The Pension Regulator
Chair: Jonathan Stapleton, Editor-in-Chief, Professional Pensions
The evolution of the Professional Pensions industry: then, now and beyond
- Latest pensions landscape and what it means for pension schemes and members
- Dealing with regulatory intensity and latest strategies to ensure that compliance priorities have been managed efficiently. What regulations are on the horizon?
- On-going professionalisation of Trustee Boards in the UK pension industry - are qualifications and requirements fit for purpose
- Predictions and forecasts- how will the market look in the future?
Moving the Pensions Regulator’s Single Code of Practice to the top of your agenda
• How should trustees be taking on the challenges of this new code and successfully applying it?
• What trustees should and could be doing in terms of preparation
• What are the expectations from the regulator?
• Own Risk Assessments-what needs to be done?
Standard Life are delighted to introduce Phoenix Insights, a new think tank focussed on longer lives and their implications for society, established by the wider Phoenix Group. Through research and analysis, and broad public engagement, Phoenix Insights aims to catalyse the action across society to enable more people to make the most of longer lives, with financial security, fulfilling and flexible work, access to lifelong learning and good health.
In this session, Director of Phoenix Insights Catherine Foot will:
- Set out the longevity challenge and its implications for how work and retirement needs to and will change
- Introduce Phoenix Insights, and its first major report, The Longer Lives Index, a comprehensive new dataset exploring people’s expectations for and confidence in retirement and later life across their savings, housing, work, health and relationships.
Please now select one of our four streams available
BlackRock has seen Fiduciary Management as an opportunity to bring solidarity to the challenges faced by pension schemes in times of turbulence in the financial markets. We have consistently looked to be innovative in the way that we construct portfolios for our clients.
At BlackRock, our investment conviction is that sustainability-integrated portfolios can provide better risk-adjusted returns to investors. So convinced are we of this stance that we have built new Capital Market Assumptions (CMAs), incorporating the opportunities and risks tied to climate change. Join our session to hear about our CMA framework and in turn how it is used to build the portfolios we design to help clients achieve their sustainability and funding objectives.
The Pensions Regulator’s new scheme funding code – a second consultation on which is due this Summer – will build on the watchdog’s messages about long-term scheme funding and journey planning. This session will look at how schemes are approaching endgame in the current regulatory and funding environment, what route to take and how best to prepare.
- Analysing the options that are good for your scheme
- Is buy-out a necessary end game for your scheme?
- How is the market developing?
- The power of a Superfund. Is a Superfund an alternative route to buyout?
• Trustee perspective on the consolidation process and how it works in practice
• Should we use DB Master Trust vs Superfund.
• What are pros and cons of these arrangement Case study
- What does a higher inflation environment mean for scheme funding, investment strategies and journey planning?
- How will higher inflation impact your members and how you communicate with them?
- What can you be doing to mitigate the impact of higher inflation on your pension schemes?
In this session keynote speakers from Emma Douglas, Head of Workplace Savings & Retirements, Aviva, and Mark Meiklejon, Head of Real Asset Investment Specialists, Aviva investors, will be assessing the case for performance over fees and what this means for the role of real assets in DC. Do first-class member experiences and first class, sustainable, investment returns deliver a better outcome than the lowest cost solution ? Join us to discuss the challenges and opportunities of delivering good member outcomes whatever the cost.
- Moving to a DC Master Trust
- What are the benefits of different options within this market?
- What does the future hold?
As many schemes move to decarbonise their portfolios and have increasingly regulatory pressure to report on the impact their portfolio is having, private markets solutions can play an important role, providing not only diversified long-term returns but also a positive environmental and social impact.
In our session, we discuss how a diversified portfolio across private markets asset classes and sectors focused on climate and social themes can help facilitate the transition to a more sustainable future. We explore climate change investing, how a portfolio can be accessible to all institutional investors including DC schemes and how to measure impact.
• How is CDC likely to evolve and how the Royal Mail scheme is progressing?
• What are the current CDC rules and how should they look to make this scheme attractive?
• Assessing main benefits and risks
• Will it only work for large schemes?
What are current pensioners spending their money on? How do we ensure that pensioners’ money lasts as long as their lifespans? Our presentation examines how DC savers can meet the challenge of increased longevity with confidence by utilising the right default strategy that is aligned to members’ long-term expectations.
- How Trustees can step up their game in supporting members during their retirement
- What would this look like?
- Improving members communication at retirement stage and communication in a lead up
- Increase in minimum pension age (MPA) and the impact MPA and a new protection regime have on members
Clara is the first DB consolidator (“superfund”) to complete The Pensions Regulator’s assessment process and is now working with trustees and sponsors on its first transactions. In this session the Clara team will reflect on how good governance is both key to a successful consolidator and to ‘end game’ decision making. They will look at:
- Clara’s development to date, including TPR’s assessment process
- The role of good governance in Clara, including for the Clara Pension Trust
- How we’ve seen trustees and sponsors working well together to prepare for a consolidation transaction
- The evolution of governance - where we’ve been & where we’re heading
- Practical examples of implementing and embedding good governance for your scheme
- The ESoG opportunity - what trustees need to be considering now
- How to make your Board more inclusive?
- Driving real value and leveraging the diversity of thought rather than a tick box exercise
- Practical examples – recruiting a more diverse board
- How Trustees reengage with their members today? What are the key challenges?
- Key strategies to help member to ensure to get best outcomes of their pension
Successful digitalisation of the pensions sector will hinge on one simple thing – the quality of scheme common data. So how good is yours? As the sector approaches unprecedented change with the introduction of pensions dashboards, learn why schemes must leverage their common data to pivot to a new way of thinking and interacting with scheme members. This session will share insights from the recent pensions digitalisation report by LexisNexis® Risk Solutions and Professional Pensions (which surveyed trustees and pension scheme members), and suggest practical steps on how a data-focussed digital future can deliver better retirement outcomes for everyone.
The world of DC pensions is changing fast, and it’s being pushed forward by member expectations, government proposals, regulations, and external factors like the rising cost of living. Not since 2012 have we seen so much change and just as tech and data management were crucial to the success of auto enrolment, they’re going to be imperative in this new wave of change.
In this session, we’ll be talking about the drivers for change and how tech together with good data analysis can not only help meet the challenges we’re now facing but also be a catalyst for bringing about real value to members. Whether it’s transitioning to net zero or implementing simplified statements, we have an opportunity to not only comply but go further and add real value to our ultimate customers, our pension members.
We’ll share with you how tech and the good use of data can help providers push forward with real change – it’s not about abandoning the present for the future; it’s possible to manage both!
- Dashboard review : the current state of the implementation
- Challenges of pensions providers connecting to the dashboard through ISPs
- Best practices on managing and organising data
- Cyber resilience in the pension sector
- The relevance of cybercrime to pension schemes
- TPR’s expectations • The nature of cybercrime
- The future of cybercrime • Understanding the vulnerabilities of your pension scheme
- Cybercrime and governance
The need to support members to engage with their pensions savings has never been more important. This session will look at how this can best be achieved from considering the various saving and financial considerations that members may have throughout their journey to retirement, through to what needs to be understood at retirement such as the how to generate income and the risks involved. It will consider why engagement matters and the role that digital support can play. The session will also demonstrate how this can be put into practice through a case study on what Pearsons did.