The pensions industry could benefit from exploring “better” solutions to consolidate rather than waiting for a scheme to collapse, Pension Protection Fund (PPF) CEO, Michelle Ostermann, has suggested.

Speaking at the Pensions Age Autumn Conference on the potential of the PPF becoming a public sector consolidator, Ostermann said: “I suggest that maybe there is a better way that the industry could be benefited that doesn’t wait for a scheme to fall over.

“There has to be a failure of the sponsor for an institution like ours to be able to add value.”

She speculated that the PPF could “pre-emptively be able to provide opportunities to schemes that need it”, before interest rates fall or schemes start to become at risk and the pension plan has to enter the PPF.

“There’s pockets and places and perhaps times, where you may need the backstop or the benefit of the industry that isn’t after the scheme has failed,” she noted.

“That pre-emptive role akin to what the PPF does today, which is when it's needed, could be defined to continue to add that value.”

However, whilst Ostermann said that "we should potentially look at a public solution”, she acknowledged that this was “the government’s decision, not ours”.

Despite this, she expressed the PPF’s willingness to explore the role further, stating: "Conceptionally to me, there is a potential role for an institution like this to play so we’ve humbly put ourselves forward to say, we will help work on what this might be.”

Under the previous government in February 2024, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) launched a consultation which included plans for a PPF-operated public sector consolidator targeting schemes unattractive to commercial endgame providers.

The PPF previously said at the time that it would be “well placed” to run a public sector consolidator, and the DWP last year called the PPF an “obvious candidate”.

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