With so many consultations launched in the past few days , it’s easy to miss what appears to be no more than a report on work done. This one is a “move on”.

Cut through the bluster, this is the central message from the Pension Minister

It is clear from the responses to the consultation that there is a shared vision for strong governance within our pension system: highly skilled trustees taking decisions in savers’ interests alongside clear accountability for outcomes.

• I wonder how many trustees regard themselves of “clear accountability for outcomes”?
• How many trustees take decision in savers’ interests?
• What is meant by strong governance?

Everyone agrees that this is what trustees should be responsible for all of this so why do we need to be “building a stronger future“?

Well it’s a vision of a different market with a lot less trustees

a clear call to action to build on this for the future market of fewer, larger schemes – where a smaller number of decision-makers will affect the outcomes of millions of savers.

Why this consultation was different was that it was asking questions about protecting the £2 trillion of savings in DC pension pots, savings heading for pensions one way or another.

There has there been very little talk of DC pots as pensions but this is coming. The tone and content is different, the tone more confident , the content reflecting a move to pensions and away from pots.

Around £2 trillion of people’s retirement savings is entrusted to the UK pensions system, and schemes will be overseeing the bulk of people’s lifetime pension savings as average defined contribution pension pots grow.

Lifetime pensions can fall because of poor governance.

The success of automatic enrolment depends on savers’ confidence that every pound they save is being managed in their interests. That confidence will be damaged if actual or perceived conflicts are allowed to exist, or if the interests of those making or influencing decisions are not clearly aligned with those of members.

Keeping the level of discussion high is the prerogative of the Pensions Minister but the tone and content of the main response is as confident and emphatic that pots will become pensions.

Whether trustees consider a DC or CDC plan an “undefined benefit” or a “defined contribution pension”, they now have the same responsibility to their pensioners.

It may not be so easy to get members to become trustees with these new larger multi-employer pensions but that doesn’t mean that trustees can be well represented. Indeed , by implication, rather better than they are today.

…we must find new ways of ensuring that a focus on the member and their needs remains central to decision making on trust boards.

What is more, the gap between DC occupational and DC contract based pots look like merging in time.

… we will further consider whether changes need to be made so that savers within contract-based pension arrangements have equivalent outcomes in terms of strong governance and protections.

New Trustee responsibility was spelt out by the Pension Schemes Bill. Now the detail is being rolled out and it’s as radical as the Act that followed.

I am pleased with the direction of this work on governance. It is another step towards the turning of pots into pension. If you read this blog regularly , you may spot in the top right hand of the blog’s site is a call for just that. There is nothing new about that call, it has been on the site well over ten years.