If I was Torsten Bell, rather than feeling smug about my speech at the LCP conference in London, I’d be reading the reports of Labour losing way to Nigel Farage and Reform

I’d not be worried about the loss of a particular parliamentary seat but that the message that Labour is doing a job is not getting home – yet.

This is the situation in pensions too.

But right now I’m reading this snapshot election of 1/4 of the electorate with about 1/3 of the voters voting, as something that can turned about but won’t till it sees something new from politicians.

I will support a Labour party that brings in change, that restores pensions to those with DC pots, that encourages DB pensions to run-on  and encourages “shared ambition” and CDC alternatives so that employers can do more than offer access to an annuity broker (itself a step forward).

So far Reynolds and now Bell have done very little to convince people in Runcorn that pensions are even a Labour issue and that’s after an appreciative time at the helm. Why should the man or woman in Doncaster or Sheffield or anywhere else in the country have the slightest interest in what is going on in the DWP or HMT?

I’ve bumped into Farage and though I don’t agree with his positions, I see in him someone who relates to ordinary people who vote for what they understand.  The people around the country simply don’t know what Labour is doing to their pocket and by not understanding, they cry out when they find there is very little change left when they delve.

Britain is going to keep voting for change until it feels it has come and Farage is the latest beneficiary of that thirst. Reform’s momentum is less about its programme than its claim to the change mantle

I hope that our very small part of Labour’s Economic and even smaller part of their overall policy will become an area where Labour can claim the change mantle and refute the bogus personal policies of Reform and Farage (hot air IMO).

I wish we could hear more on pensions from the unions, I would like to see leaders of large employers in retail, pharmaceuticals, transport and other great employers speaking out and I want to hear those Federations and Confederations that support smaller employers to better understand what Labour’s mantle of change is.

The message is that pensions are delivered through the workplace, through saving into plans that pay pensions over time. It’s a message that Government does not allow insurers and asset managers to dictate to employers what they get but where organisations such as Nest and People’s and large DB plans like USS and Railways find ways to provide employers with more than a demand for defined contributions, where the promise to members is for basic pension for sure with increases driven by market returns (the Nest intent).

I believe that after a decade since “defined ambition” we are moving beyond the CDC experiment to something that can allow small employers to pay the same into CDC as they do into workplace DC and promise a pension not a pot. I believe that Nest and schemes such as PSH which I promote will offer shared ambition with a stronger promise (albeit less ambitious than pure CDC).

These are the discussions we “experts” should be having between each other but we should think of the people of Runcorn (a town I know a little from days in the workplace).

I hope that Labour is going to use its excellent ideas to demonstrate it has a mantle of change and I will promote it , the little I can. Right now I hope that what happens in the local elections and the one parliamentary seat being fought, will show that Labour needs our help and everything it can get to help it publish it has a mantle of change.