The next government should “focus on the biggest issue of all – providing a decent pension at the end of a lifetime of work", the Association of Member Nominated Trustees (AMNT) has said ahead of the UK’s fast-approaching general election.

AMNT laid out its wishlist for a new government, which includes improvements to existing schemes, as well as changes for self-employed workers and the need for enhanced environmental, social and governance (ESG) stewardship powers for trustees.

The group said that current personal pension provision is “demonstrably failing” for those not in defined contribution (DB) schemes, and cited the 2004 Pensions Commission report, which concluded that people on an average income required the equivalent of two-thirds of their pay as a pension to enjoy a comfortable retirement, and urged the incoming government to “put this aim front and centre of all future policy decisions.”

For those in DB schemes, AMNT said it was “in the government’s and workers’ interests to keep those that are still open going, and to return their benefits to earlier, higher levels".

AMNT also took aim at the current government’s proposal to allow sponsoring employers access to pension surpluses, which it called “unfair,” and suggested instead that surpluses be used to “ensure the inflation proofing of pensions is restored, both for the recent years of high inflation and those in ‘pre 97’ pensions with no uplifts.”

Regarding defined contribution (DC) schemes, AMNT said that current structures leave little chance of achieving two-thirds of final pay as a pension.

The group said current plans to improve auto-enrolment, including lowering the qualifying age of to 18, “will help”, but added: “AMNT also asks that the new multi-employer collective defined contribution (CDC) system, which can produce much better returns for pension savers, should be rolled out with urgency and focus right from the start on aiming for a pension of two-thirds of the member’s pay.”

It also called for the next government to investigate how “millions of freelance, casual and self-employed workers,” many of whom have no pensions, could access the benefits of the CDC system.

AMNT also called for changes to strengthen stewardship powers for trustees, to bring an end to “the monopoly of fund managers to vote the holdings in pooled funds however they like regardless of the views of pension funds.”

AMNT said: “We regard climate change as a systemic risk, not just to the assets of pension schemes, but also to the world in which our pensioner members will eventually retire and it is our fiduciary duty to be able to exercise our stewardship.”

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