Last month the Pensions Age team and I attended the PLSA’s annual conference and for once, there seemed to be very little change – and that’s not just in reference to the copious amounts of food and drink!

If asked to summarise my takeaway on the current pensions and savings landscape from the conference it would be: maintaining improvement. The conference presented no major, shock announcements, with a theme of development and improvement to existing regulation and policies largely prevalent within the majority of sessions.

Department for Work and Pensions, director of private pensions and stewardship Charlotte Clark warned that the DB white paper, to be published early next year will be the “last chance” to make changes to the sector. “The white paper won’t immediately lead to new legislation, but more in terms of another stage of how do we develop this and how do we ensure that we make the right changes now,” Clark said.

On the DC side, a lot of debate centred on the development of auto-enrolment. Pensions Policy Institute director and AE review contributor, Chris Curry, noted that there is international evidence that where employers make higher contributions there is generally higher engagement levels, which could be something for the UK to follow.

Also considering ways to improve the policy, Aon head of DC consulting Sophia Singleton added that auto-escalation of minimum DC contribution rates is a possible solution to solving pension saving adequacy issues. “We do need the government to look beyond Brexit and increase the default soon if we are going to make AE a success,” she commented.

Looking to the Budget, several members of the pensions industry have, (while predicting further cuts to the lifetime and annual allowance) hoped for an unsurprising budget. Industry figures such as former Pensions Minister Steve Webb recently asked the government to leave the industry alone. Despite this, it has also been speculated that there could be further “salami slicing” of pensions tax relief.

From general response it is evident that continued development was and is the shared, agreed and most manageable theme on which the majority of areas in the pensions arena should be addressed. While we are conditioned to see change as a positive thing, in this instance, the industry seems to be clinging to the possibility of very little change being introduced in the near future. Rather, the pensions sector looks to improve and streamline what already exists.

So, last month, I was pleased to note that the conference brought very little shocks, just desired developments… let’s just hope tomorrow’s Budget provides us with the same!

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