Building a Fairer Future: Reflections from the TUC Pensions Conference 2025

Building a Fairer Future: Reflections from the TUC Pensions Conference 2025

The annual TUC Pensions Conference returned this year with a powerful sense of urgency, and for the first time, it was also streamed online due to overwhelming interest. Across a packed day of speeches, panel discussions, and workshops, one message rang clear: the UK pensions system faces major challenges, but there are also real opportunities for reform.

The Stark Reality: Low Contributions, Poor Pensions

Kate Bell, Assistant General Secretary of the TUC, opened the conference with a sobering statistic: six in ten people enrolled in Defined Contribution (DC) pension schemes are on track to retire without a decent income. That’s seven million people at risk of poverty in retirement.

Bell was clear, the current level of contributions is simply too low, and increasing them is not optional if we want secure retirements for all. She warned that poor wages today are leading inevitably to poor pensions tomorrow.

The TUC supports the consolidation of pension schemes into master trusts or “superfunds”, arguing that fewer, larger schemes mean more stability, better investment opportunities, and stronger bargaining power. However, Bell emphasised that members must always have a voice, pensions must never become a silent subsidy for employers or the government.

Government Priorities: Fewer, Bigger Schemes

Next, Torsten Bell, Minister for Pensions, outlined the government's priorities. Consolidation is already happening, he said, with an eye to reducing administrative costs and eliminating “small pots” tiny pension savings scattered across multiple schemes that fail to generate meaningful retirement income.

The government's mantra is "value for money” focusing on net returns for savers. However, the Minister acknowledged that DC scheme members currently shoulder all the investment risk, and that must change if the system is to become sustainable.

State Pension costs are expected to rise by £31 billion in coming years, underlining the need for urgent reforms.

A Long View on Reform

A panel led by Baroness Jeannie Drake (Labour peer and former Pensions Commission member), John Neale (Unite the Union), and Mubin Haq (Aberdeen Financial Fairness Fund) reminded delegates that pensions reform is a marathon, not a sprint.

Despite an ageing population, state pension spending is expected to rise only modestly from 4.9% to 5.8% of GDP thanks in part to a surprising levelling off in life expectancy trends. But structural reform is still needed, especially to encourage pension funds to invest in infrastructure projects, even as concerns linger about government hypocrisy (for instance, the House of Commons Pension Fund barely invests in infrastructure itself).

The panel stressed that trustees have a duty to act solely in the best interests of members, not to serve government investment plans, a vital point often overlooked.

National Wealth Fund: Promise and Peril

Discussions then turned to the National Wealth Fund (NWF), the rebranded UK Infrastructure Bank. Jesse Griffiths (Finance Innovation Lab), Tom Railton (Prospect union), and George Dollner (Pensions Lifetime Savings Association) outlined the three main risks facing the Fund: its mandate, its governance, and its scale.

Currently worth £26 billion (expected to grow to £40 billion this Parliament), the NWF is tiny compared to sovereign wealth funds globally. It must lead private investment into UK infrastructure but without political interference, without becoming a government piggy bank, and while offering returns that pension funds can responsibly accept.

Issuing bonds, as other sovereign funds do, could be part of the answer. But caution is needed: attracting private equity and hedge funds could see UK money flowing overseas instead of supporting British growth.

Workshops: Tackling Poverty and Managing Surpluses

After lunch, delegates broke into workshops. I attended two.

Raising Incomes for the Poorest Pensioners
Led by Daniella Silcock (pension researcher), Josie Irwin (UNISON), and Morgan Vine (Independent Age), this session highlighted that 16% of pensioners live in relative poverty, with 10% in deep poverty. Single women, carers, disabled people, ethnic minorities, and renters are especially vulnerable.

Solutions include better promotion of underused benefits like ‘Attendance Allowance’ and Council Tax discounts, tackling digital exclusion, and greater outreach by charities like Independent Age and Money Helper.

Can DB Scheme Surpluses Be Safely Released?
Douglas Primrose (actuary) and Jack Jones (TUC) led a discussion on the technicalities of Defined Benefit (DB) scheme surpluses. Despite headlines suggesting £60 billion in excess, the reality is more complex. Surpluses aren’t "spare cash" — they're fluctuating valuations based on market movements.

Realising a surplus as cash is difficult, heavily taxed, and fraught with fiduciary duty challenges. While surplus funds could be creatively reinvested, or even used to reopen closed schemes, any moves must be cautious and legally watertight.

Championing Member Representation

In an inspiring session, speakers including Paul Finch (British Columbia Investment Management), Maggie Rodger (Church of England Pension Board), and Helen Shay (Universities Superannuation Scheme) made the case for greater member representation on pension boards.

Member-nominated trustees were praised for:

• Preventing employer clawbacks
• Ensuring transparency
• Advocating for members' interests in investment strategy
• Building trust in pension governance

In short, when members have a real say, outcomes improve for everyone.

The Pensions Regulator: Looking Ahead

Finally, Nausicaa Delfas, Chief Executive of The Pensions Regulator (TPR), set out the regulator's vision. Key upcoming changes include:

• New duties for trustees to offer retirement income products
• Encouraging closed DB schemes to consolidate into superfunds
• Making value-for-money a formal standard
• Boosting investment in climate-aware assets

Delfas warned that 12.5 million people are still under-saving, particularly those born in the 1970s, and that the upcoming Pensions Reform Bill will aim to tackle these systemic issues.

A personal conversation with Delfas after the session revealed assurances about the cybersecurity of the new ‘pension dashboards’ (expected in 2026), but also admitted worries about how digitally excluded groups will access them.

Final Thoughts

This year's TUC Pensions Conference was a reminder that the UK’s pension system stands at a crossroads. Reform is essential, but it must be fair, inclusive, and member-driven. As one delegate aptly put it: "Without real reform, there may be no world worth retiring into."

We owe it to future generations to get it right.