The Local Government Pension Scheme – which is responsible for the retirement savings of nearly seven million Brits – has sounded a warning over government’s plans to shake-up retirement funding. It warned the government that although it provides guaranteed pensions for many workers, those pensions were still very small, with some only averaging around £3k a year.
The scheme, which was the focus of the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association’s annual local authority conference in Bedford this week, was told it was facing a long to-do list which included government proposals which may force it to invest in more riskier UK growth assets.
Roger Phillips, chair of the LGPS Scheme Advisory Board for England and Wales said: « There’s things like dashboards, McCloud as well as Fit for the Future, and we also have local government reform. » “So this is one hell of a lot that’s going on, and we still have to do the day job.”
Mr Phillips pointed out that the current Government was “very interested in us [LGPS]” and this presented a challenge to its existence. : “But we need to keep doing our day job as we do it well.”
He said: “We are the sixth largest scheme in the world and both this government and the previous one have felt that we didn’t punch our weight.”
He said the role of the LGPS was often underplayed and it was providing pensions for some of the lowest paid workers in the public sector.
“It’s about your cooks, your cleaners and your classroom assistants who will have a pension well below £10,000 a year, not a substantive amount above the state pension.”
“And my message to you is that, yes, politicians and government want us to do things, but at the end of the day how many complaints do we get from our pensioners, very few. that says something about the quality of administration governance?”
“Of course, be mindful of the impact that if we don’t look after it wisely, the impact that has on employers and indirectly, council taxpayers as well.”
Laura Colliss, fund manager at the North East of Scotland Pension Fund, sounded a warning to the government over plans to force pension funds to invest in more riskier UK growth assets.
She said: “The LGPS is not here to shore up the UK’s economy. It’s here to pay pensions often very low paid members pensions, which they absolutely wholly rely on. And that’s our prime objective.”
Mr Phillips also expressed concern that the government’s plans to mandate UK private asset investment may place strain on relationships between employers and employee representatives.
He said: “We have worked tirelessly to bring employer and employee representatives together so that we work as one in the interest and best interest and reputation of LGBs, if ever there’s a divergence of views on that that will take us into new territory, and probably interesting territory to try and deal with as well.”
Mr Phillips also used the session to go through the main findings of the LGPS scheme-wide annual report for the 12 months ending 31 March 2024.
Total membership increased by 2.8 % to 6.68 million members with over 2 million pensioners paid during the year; of those 2.15 million were active members, 2.4 million were deferred and 2.14 were pensioners.
Total assets of the LGPS increased 10.1% to £390bn while the return on investment was 8.9% during the 12 months.
However administration and governance costs rose 5.7% while investment management fees increased by £49.6m.
Mr Phillips said:
He said: “ The government also is watching that figure and [wanting to] understand why that figure is as high as his.
“And whilst you can talk about the percentage of the overall investment there is, there is a focused interest on that figure.”
