Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
It's the bit about you blaming taxation for the failure of some when that
just isn't so - without at least mentioning poor investment management and
excessive administration charges, etc.

AIUI, there have also been Labour government specified changes to the
assets held by pension funds. The result is that less of the fund is
equity invested. This has produced a real problem in the last two years,
in that the stock market has shown returns of, say 20%, against bond
returns of less than 5%. This has further reduced the viability of
company pension schemes. The idea of zero risk from bonds sounds fine,
but in the real actuarial world, the stock market has always long term
returned 10% I believe. As sound companies have to meet these new
shortfalls in their pension scheme from profits, they are obviously
going to close these schemes as fast as possible. I was informed that
the pension scheme contribution holidays in the 90's arose partly
because the IR rules do not allow a pension fund to have an actuarial
surplus. Hence the company benefited from a contributions holiday and
the IR gained an increase in tax revenue. Perhaps someone can clarify this?

Regards
Capitol