I have had a PDF in my inbox for some time and I finally got to read it this morning. It’s from William McGrath, who many will know is a former CEO of Aga and someone who thinks a lot about funding DB pension plans.
I think this is well said by William. William and I had a long conversation yesterday about how we can get action amongst pension trustees and concluded that we needed employers to wake up to the brilliance of their pensions and stop considering them as things to de-risk.
We have cleverer people than I who express their feelings using phrases such as William’s. I may have been cleverer before my accident (I can’t remember) but I think back to Bob Dylan who refused to accept a prestigious literary award in Stockholm claiming that he was working his hardest to be a musician.
I don’t aspire to be clever or a good blogger. WTW have invited for another year of being humiliated by not winning any awards in their show. That really isn’t the point. William and I sat down and worked out the things we could do to help Run on 4 Good. I went away to think some more and I still haven’t got the idea properly sorted in my head. This is not about showing off, it’s about getting things done.
But I think there are enough people who want pensions to Run on 4 Good that we could get a Concrete Proposal to Government and could do so by March 11th when the Pensions Minister is coming to Edinburgh to discuss with us what Government can do by way of simple additives to be the trigger for growth.
I hope that William and his gang can join up with John and his gang and the Pension Plowman and his gang because we really have got a Pension Minister who has the capacity to understand and the determination to do concrete things.