The Local Pension Board met on Monday 3 March 2025 to review the current update on pension fund matters as at 31 December 2024. The meeting also included the approval of the minutes from the previous meeting held on 18 December 2024.

Current Update on Pension Fund Matters

The board was scheduled to receive an update on pension fund matters as of 31 December 2024. This report aimed to provide members with information on current pension scheme matters and an overview of the Pension Fund's investment performance.

The report detailed the responsibilities of the Local Pension Board, which include assisting the Administering Authority in ensuring the effective and efficient governance and administration of the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) in accordance with the LGPS Regulations 2013 and other relevant legislation and requirements from The Pensions Regulator (TPR).

Key areas covered in the update included:

• Pension Administration Function: An overview of the team responsible for managing pension payments, benefit processing, contribution collection, and record maintenance. The report noted that the team consists of 8.78 full-time equivalents, including the Pensions Manager.
• Current Work Programme: This included ongoing work with the Corporate Fraud Team, with a total of £192,977 in current overpayments identified as of November 2024. Efforts to locate pensioners living abroad had resulted in savings of over £17,000 per year. Mortality checking for pensioners in Great Britain was ongoing, and the team had produced a significant number of Annual Benefit Statements for deferred beneficiaries.
• Topical Issues: Discussions were scheduled to cover the McCloud Judgement, which requires work to identify members in scope and those needing a remedy. The development of Pensions Dashboards, which will allow individuals to access their pension information online, was also on the agenda, with the administration team looking into the provision of a required Integrated Service Provider (ISP). The report also noted the submission of the annual TPR survey, with Common Data Scores of 96.9% and Scheme Specific Data Scores of 88.6%. Preparations for the 2025 fund valuation were underway, focusing on data cleansing. The write-off of pension overpayments up to £250 was also mentioned, as was a review of The Pensions Regulator's Code of Practice.
• Performance: The report indicated that the Pension Administration Team had met targets for PEN01 and PEN04 but not for PEN02 and PEN03, attributed to ongoing issues with information from Dataplan and the issuance of Annual Benefit Statements. The report provided data on the processing of retirement and death grants, as well as transfer values and refunded contributions between April and December 2024.
• Pension Fund Investments: The performance of the Pension Fund's investments as at 31 December 2024 was to be reviewed. Global equity markets had risen over the quarter, influenced by improving inflation figures and expectations of interest rate cuts. The global government bond market also saw price increases. The report detailed the Fund's investment managers and their performance objectives, as well as the strategic asset allocation. The overall fund performance showed it had outperformed its benchmark over one year and five years, but under-performed over the quarter and the three-year period.

Approval of Minutes

The board was also scheduled to approve the minutes of the previous meeting held on 18 December 2024. The minutes from that meeting noted apologies for absence from Laura Kirman and confirmed that there were no urgent items or declarations of interest. The previous meeting's minutes from 26 September 2024 were approved, and a current update on pension fund matters as at 30 September 2024 was discussed. The date of the next meeting was confirmed as 3 March 2025.