The retirement gender pay gap is £6,500 per year, although it has shrunk slightly over the last 12 months, according to new research from Prudential. Men expect to retire on average incomes of £19,400 per year - 50% more than women, who an  More...
17 May 2011 09:14

The abolition of the default retirement age (DRA) and the advent of flexible retirement could signal the end of pensions as we know them. Traditionally, pension schemes have been about retirement and death benefits. In the new world of prolonged wor  More...
22 March 2011 09:07

Millions of public sector employees should work for longer and receive smaller pensions, according to a government-commissioned report over which unions have threatened widespread industrial action. Former Labour pensions secretary Lord Hutton's la  More...
10 March 2011 12:41

Work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith has pledged to press on with the Government's reform of the state pension, which would see an end to means testing and the imposition of a £140-per-week flat payment. The changes will mean tha  More...
08 March 2011 15:41

Employers will face a bill of £23.87 billion because of a raft of employment law changes coming into force over the next four years, the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC) has claimed. Chris Mordue, partner at Pinsent Masons, out  More...
15 February 2011 12:52

The Pensions Bill, which will introduce auto-enrolment and bring forward a rise in state pension age, has been described as "good news for businesses" by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI). Employers will be required to automatically en  More...
13 January 2011 16:52

The new pension tax regime is effective from 6 April 2011. A reduced annual allowance for pension contributions of £50,000 and an increase in the valuation factor applying to defined benefit pension schemes are the most significant elements. Howeve  More...
13 January 2011 00:00

Two-thirds of small employers do not offer pension schemes, while others have failed to keep up with the cost of providing sufficient contributions. This is according to a survey of small firms conducted by the Association of Consulting Actuaries (A  More...
04 January 2011 14:42

Firms have been left confused after the Government backtracked on moves aimed at slashing the cost of providing pensions. It has emerged that private sector pension schemes will not be forced to use the consumer prices index (CPI) measure of inflat  More...
09 December 2010 16:11

The Government's decisions to remove the default retirement age (DRA) and oblige firms to auto-enrol all employees into a pension scheme will "deal a double blow to smaller employers", according to the Forum of Private Business (FPB).   More...
01 November 2010 09:49

The BBC will be hit by strike action next month after National Union of Journalists (NUJ) members voted to reject the corporation management's revised pension proposals. Approximately 70% of NUJ members voted to reject what director general Mark Tho  More...
28 October 2010 17:17

Employers need to take action now to understand how Government proposals on pension auto-enrolment will affect their HR processes, Deloitte has warned. The call came after the professional services firm's survey of 43 major employers - with a  More...
28 October 2010 15:38

The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) says it is "severely disappointed" that the Government will not make the smallest firms exempt from automatic enrolment into pension schemes, due to come into force in 2012. The Department for Work and Pensi  More...
27 October 2010 13:53

Jacqui Timmins, pensions partner at Pinsent Masons, sets out the current position on auto-enrolment and the steps employers need to take to ensure compliance. The Government is pushing ahead with plans to force small  More...
27 October 2010 11:39

The Cabinet Office has insisted that offering civil servants early retirement on full final-salary pensions in exchange for giving up a lump-sum redundancy payout will prove a cost effective way of cutting staff numbers. Under planned changes to the  More...
26 October 2010 11:36

The Government's guarantee to back the pension scheme at BT must apply to all of the company's employees, the High Court ruled today. The decision marks a victory for the scheme's trustees who had argued that the so-called "Crown guarantee" to cove  More...
21 October 2010 15:39

Industry groups have backed the changes to the UK's pensions system unveiled in today's Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) . Chancellor George Osborne announced that the planned rise in state pension age for men and women to 66 by the year 2020  More...
20 October 2010 16:53

The EMI Group has escaped censure from the Pensions Regulator after agreeing a funding deal worth nearly £200 million with its pension scheme's trustees to address its pensions deficit. The payment plan will see the embattled music giant make   More...
19 October 2010 11:07

Lord Hutton yesterday delivered his interim report into the future of public sector pensions . Daniel Thomas reports on how the recommendations were received by employers, unions and industry groups. The issue of public sector pensions has lon  More...
08 October 2010 15:55

Lord Hutton has called for an end to final-salary pensions in the public sector and has said that workers should make more pension contributions, in an independent report published today. The interim report by Lord Hutton, commissioned by Chancellor  More...
07 October 2010 13:00