ABSTRACT
The Robert Maxwell saga led to media highlighting of pensions and the overdue realisation that the framework within which occupational pensions operated was in need of overhaul. The House of Commons Social Security Select Committee (Second Report ‘The Operation of Pension Funds’, House of Commons Papers session 61-11, 1991-92, para 13) commented:
The Goode Report (‘The Report of The Pension Law Review Committee’ (1993) Command 2342-1) was established:
The scope of reference of the Committee was broad – it extended to all forms of occupational pensions, whether in the public or private domain, whether funded or not, and irrespective of whether the scheme was a contracted-in or out scheme. It was only to concern itself with personal pensions, insofar as the issues dealt with were common to both forms of scheme. The Report made six key recommendations, namely: (1) Trust law was to remain the foundation for interests, rights, and duties
arising in relation to occupational pension schemes, but was to be reinforced by a Pensions Act (the 1995 statute) administered by a Pensions Regulatory Body (aptly named the Occupational Pensions Regulatory Authority).
