Automatic enrolment to workplace pensions inquiry
Closed
What the inquiry looked at
“The government faces significant challenges in ensuring that people have adequate incomes in retirement. People are living longer and fewer have been saving into workplace pension schemes than in the past. Automatic enrolment aims to reverse the long-term decline in the number of people saving into workplace pensions. The Department for Work and Pensions, The Pensions Regulator and The National Employment Savings Trust have worked together to introduce the automatic enrolment programme, doing so successfully for large and medium-sized employers who account for around 20 million workers. They now face a greater challenge as 1.8 million smaller employers are required to enrol their workers by 2018. Programme spending is so far on track and opt-out rates have been lower than expected at between 8% and 14%. This inquiry looks at the risks of registering smaller employers and how DWP ensures that more widespread enrolment translates into higher retirement incomes.”
The committee's words, from the inquiry page on parliament.uk ↗.
What it found
Since the introduction of automatic enrolment in October 2012, almost all larger employers have enrolled their workers in a workplace pension, thereby increasing the number of people saving for retirement. Employer compliance has been high and the proportion of people choosing to opt out from automatic enrolment has been lower than expected. The Department for Work & Pensions, The Pensions Regulator and the National Employment Savings Trust and other pension providers are now facing the more difficult task of supporting 1.8 million small employers through automatic enrolment. They will need to monitor the experiences of small businesses–including 900,000 employers with only 1 or 2 employees—and minimise administrative burdens, while also ensuring that increased enrolment translates into adequate incomes in retirement. We will be returning to this subject, which is of vital importance to both employees themselves and to future governments as they plan for pensions, and we have asked the Department to update us on progress over the next 12 months.
What the government said
No government response is linked to this report.
How the inquiry ran
Each dot is a dated item listed on this page, from the inquiry's opening on 3 November 2015 to 6 February 2017.
- Oral evidence 23 Nov 2015
- Report 27 Jan 2016
- Correspondence 6 Feb 2017
What it recommended
The committee's recommendations are not listed here yet. Read them in 18th Report - Automatic enrolment to workplace pensions ↗ on parliament.uk.
Evidence
Oral evidence sessions 1
- 23 Nov 2015No witnesses recordedparliament.uk ↗