Clause 51
Pensions Bill
1:45 pm
Nigel Waterson (Shadow Minister, Work & Pensions; Eastbourne, Conservative)
I beg to move amendment No. 26, in clause 51, page 25, line 15, leave out subsection (5).
This is a rather simple probing amendment. It is not entirely clear why such a scheme order should exclude liability for a trustee, officer or employee of the trust arising from administration or management, or provide an indemnity for such liability. It might be merely that there is a precedent and that is what happens already. However, there will, potentially, be significant liabilities for trustees, officers and employees in running the scheme, so one wonders why they should be excluded from liability. If they are not liable, who is?
Putting it another way, and looking at the analogy of non-executive directors, is there a prospect of insurance being obtained against that liability? If there is a liability, that presumably means that somebody, somewhere—the members, I guess—have lost out. If they cannot look to the trustees, officers or employees, who would they look to? That is a very long question to the Minister, which I am sure that he will answer in his inimitable fashion.