BoE<\/a> governor joined a chorus of criticism against the measure. \u201cWe\u2019ve had a low level of pension fund investment in the economy and I think structural changes to the pension industry are helpful in this effect.\u201d<\/p>\n\u201cHowever, I do not support mandating, I don\u2019t think that\u2019s appropriate,\u201d\u00a0Bailey said in a press conference. \u201cI think reforming the pensions industry does require a lot of heavy lifting,\u201d he added, but stressed he hoped any changes would be \u201cnatural\u201d.<\/p>\n
Sir Steve Webb, a former pensions minister and partner at consultancy LCP, said Bailey \u201cwill not have chosen lightly to be so critical of government policy\u201d and his \u201cnuclear\u201d intervention would be unwelcome at the Department for Work and Pensions.<\/p>\n
The challenge from the BoE \u201craises serious questions about whether this policy will survive scrutiny in the House of Commons and House of Lords over the coming months\u201d, Webb said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Some pension experts have called on the government to drop the measure in the pensions bill that allows regulators to force a minimum investment amount in private markets, arguing that it is not framed as a reserve power.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe agree with the governor of the BoE that the best route for increasing pension fund allocation to UK investment is for the sector to work in partnership with government on a voluntarily, market-led basis and in a way that is consistent with member interest,\u201d said Zoe Alexander, director of policy at Pensions UK trade group.<\/p>\n
Under a voluntary commitment called the Mansion House Accord, 17 of the UK\u2019s largest DC workplace pension providers have pledged to invest at least 5 per cent of their assets in UK private markets by 2030, provided the assets were sufficiently attractive.<\/p>\n
The pensions bill was introduced in parliament last month and had its second reading this week. It is expected to become law next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stay informed with free updates Simply sign up to the Pensions industry myFT Digest — delivered directly to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":251408,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3093],"tags":[51,474,2499,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-251407","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-finance","10":"tag-personal-finance","11":"tag-uk","12":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114824648641796191","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}