Automatic enrolment: earnings trigger and qualifying earnings band 2016/17 17 December 2015 After a review of the automatic enrolment earnings trigger and qualifying earnings band, the Government has decided to freeze thresholds at 2015-16 figures, apart from the qualifying earnings band upper level which will increase to £43,000. The automatic enrolment earnings trigger determines who gets automatically enrolled into a workplace pension. The qualifying earnings band sets minimum contribution levels for money purchase pension schemes. The minimum of the band is also relevant for defining who can opt in if they earn under the earnings trigger.
The government reviews these every year and revises them if appropriate. Analysis has been published which supports the review of the earnings trigger and qualifying earnings band for 2016/17.
The lower level of qualifying earnings will remain at £5,824. The earnings trigger for automatic enrolment will remain at £10,000 The upper level of qualifying earnings will increase from £42,385 to £43,000
MPs launch automatic enrolment inquiry 23 December 2015
The Work and Pensions Committee has launched an inquiry into automatic enrolment.
It has invited written evidence on the implementation of the legislation so far, especially the effects on small and micro employers. In particular, the committee is looking at how smaller employers plan to mitigate any negative effects and how the Department for Work and Pensions support for small and medium-sized businesses has helped them meet their obligations. The review will also look at the suitability of the auto-enrolment earnings threshold and minimum contribution rates, along with analysis of delays to the implementation of increases to minimum contributions that were announced in the Autumn Statement. Committee chairman Frank Field said "Automatic enrolment is generally perceived as being successful to date, but in the early stages of delivery it was only large and medium sized employers that had to meet these new pension requirements. The time has now come for smaller employers, including people who would not consider themselves business people - such as those who employ nannies and carers - to participate. We must ensure they are in a position to cope with these new obligations."
The CIPP will be feeding into this inquiry and will be publishing a survey very shortly to gather your views.
Automatic enrolment: British domiciled seafarers 11 January 2016
The Pensions Regulator issued Fleet Maritime Services (Bermuda) Ltd. with a compliance notice for failing to automatically enrol British-domiciled seafarers regularly working aboard its cruise ships.
Do British seafarers employed on ships operating wholly or principally outside of UK territorial waters “ordinarily work in Great Britain under their contracts” for the purposes of s.1 Pensions Act 2008?
In R (Fleet Maritime Services (Bermuda) Limited) v The Pensions Regulator the High Court (Leggatt J) determined that they do if they work from a ‘base’ in Britain, but that this will not be the case if they do not habitually begin and end their tours of duty from a British port. The Regulator issued the Bermuda-incorporated Claimant with a compliance notice for failing to auto-enrol British-domiciled seafarers regularly working aboard its cruise ships. The Claimant brought a judicial review because its ships operated principally outside of British territorial waters. The Court concluded that the Lawson v Serco approach to determining a peripatetic worker's ‘base’ for the purposes of unfair dismissal jurisdiction was also applicable to the 2008 Act. The Court further determined that, irrespective of duration aboard, seafarers are, under the 2008 Act, based at the port from which their tours of duty
CIPP Policy News Journal
25/04/2016, Page 339 of 453
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