The Pensions Regulator (TPR) has increased the level of intervention efforts and said it is prepared to take action against rogue employers, amid growing political pressures over its role in major pension schemes defaulting.
From January to March, the watchdog said it had used its enforcement powers 35,862 times, compared to 28, 448 interventions during the previous quarter. This includes 11,156 fixed penalty notices to employers, compared to 7,435 the previous quarter. Compliance notices were issued 19,986 times, compared to 17,949 at the end of last year.
TPR’s executive director of Frontline Regulation, Nicola Parish comments on the figures: “We are working to be a clearer, quicker and tougher regulator. Very often, being clear that we are fully prepared to use our powers gets employers and trustees to the table and means members are safeguarded more quickly. Several cases are resolved thanks to clear and robust negotiation by our case teams and the early engagement of companies and trustees.”
One factor driving the growth of enforcement actions is the fact that a relatively high number of employers has reached their staging date, the date when their automatic enrolment duties apply, at the end of autumn 2017. Consequently, the number of requested reviews of statutory notices for automatic enrolment increased from 2202 at the end of 2017 to 3925 in the first three months of 2018.
TPR’s director of Automatic Enrolment, Darren Ryder, comments: “Huge numbers of employers are starting their workplace pensions duties every month and the vast majority are successfully meeting their duties. However, where an employer fails to do the right thing for their staff, we will take action using the wide range of powers available to us.”
The regulator has recently faced growing political pressures over its failure to prevent the default of major pension schemes such the Carillion DB schemes, which will have to be taken over by the Pension Protection Fund.
Labour MP’s Frank Field, chair of the Work and Pensions Committee, and Rachel Reeves, chair of the business, energy and industrial strategy committee recently wrote to the regulators’ chair Mark Boyle and questioned the targets it set itself for the coming year.
In its parliamentary inquiry on the Carillion scandal, the Committee argued that the regulator had “failed in all of its objectives” and that a “cultural change” at the top of the organisation was required. The regulator was also described as “tentative and apologetic.”
