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Shadow Pensions Minister Extends the Pensions Debate
Shadow Pensions Minister, Nigel Waterson, was the keynote speaker at our 2004 Employers’ Update Seminar, which was held in Cambridge in March. The seminar, which is hosted by NW Brown Employee Benefits, covers topical employment taxation, employee benefits and human resources issues.
In an informative and refreshingly apolitical talk, Mr Waterson urged everyone to participate in the pensions debate. He even challenged the audience to come up with a new brand name for pensions. Mr Waterson believes that the existing word has considerable negative overtones and creates images of cardigans, slippers and no teeth. Remuneration planning expert Guy Mulley, of NW Brown Employee Benefits, who chaired the seminar, referred also to the negative press about Equitable Life and failed final salary schemes and to the unhelpful ‘snapshot’ accounting treatment of pension schemes.
Mr Waterson was able to give the audience of employers a parliamentary insight into the current Pensions Bill. Remarkably, despite such an important subject, the Pensions Bill had not even been finished when it was first presented to Parliament. As a result, there have already been over 100 amendments to the Bill as the Government tacks on various missing provisions. The Shadow Pensions Minister wondered why we continue to use 65 as the standard retirement age, it being a figure that Bismarck had first selected over 100 years ago when life expectancy was much shorter. He also despaired of a system where it is easier for an employer to close a pension scheme than to start one.
Another of the speakers, NW Brown Corporate Pensions expert, Ron Dart, cast doubt on the validity of the Government’s thinking. Mr Dart cited the Government’s misconception concerning the actual uses of Small Self-Administered Schemes. He also voiced his doubts about the Government’s claim that people do not take out pensions because they are too difficult to understand – the truth is people do not take out pensions because there is no compulsion to do so. This trend looks set to continue or even to rise, given that an individual currently needs to have a pension fund of more than £180,000 in order to enjoy a better retirement than the State will currently provide via the social security and tax credits system.
Ferraris announced the completion of the sale of its Metalcraft business based in Chatteris to Avingtrans for £8.1m made up of cash of £7.5m, assumption of leasing liabilities of £0.5m and £100,00due in a year’s time. After allowing for the transfer of the freehold property and the conversion of inter company loans into share capital the profit on disposal will be £2m. The proceeds will be used by Ferraris to reduce debt and to expand the medical diagnostics activities.
Copies of the seminar delegate pack are available, in return for a £25 contribution to “The Friends of Addenbrookes”, the charitable fund-raising arm of Addenbrookes NHS Hospital. To obtain a copy please send your cheque to Guy Mulley at NW Brown Employee Benefits, Richmond House, 16-20 Regent Street, Cambridge, CB2 1DB.
Feature Created: 2007-10-10
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