The noble Baroness, Lady Drake, is absolutely correct and I am glad that she pointed out the difference to me. I would like to meet her before Committee to address that issue, if she is happy to do so.
The noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, asked why the Government have not legislated for the measures in the 2017 automatic enrolment review in this Bill. The Government have set out their ambition to lower the age at which people are automatically enrolled from 22 to 18 and to abolish the AE lower earnings limit in the mid-2020s. Our approach will be to expand the coverage and increase the amounts put into retirement savings by millions of working people, focusing on younger people and lower earners.
The noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, and the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, raised the subject of the self-employed. The 2017 automatic enrolment review concluded that the current automatic enrolment framework is not suitable for the self-employed. They are a highly diverse group and one solution will not necessarily fit all. The Government have committed to carrying out research trials to form the evidence base and future policy.
The noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, asked what the Government are doing to tackle investment scams—an issue raised by other noble Lords. These scams are
outrageous. The Government are committed to raising awareness about pensions scams to help protect consumers. As part of this, the Financial Conduct Authority launched its ScamSmart campaign to raise awareness of the steps that people can take to avoid investment scams. During the campaign, 173,000 users visited the ScamSmart site, and 376 users were warned about an unauthorised firm.
The noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, raised the need for a stronger nudge towards guidance, as provided for in Sections 18 and 19 of the Financial Guidance and Claims Act 2018. In that Act, we committed to test different approaches to providing a stronger nudge towards Pension Wise guidance. Pension Wise began this work on Royal Assent of the Act and it was picked up at the launch of the Money and Pensions Service. Trials commenced in October 2019. We are on course for those trials to finish and for qualitative work to be undertaken ready for the publication of the evaluation report in the summer.
Many noble Lords raised the question of whether there should be one dashboard or multiple dashboards, and the views on that were mixed. My noble friend Lady Fookes asked why there should not be just one, but I was interested to hear the noble Lord, Lord Sharkey, say that multiple dashboards will give consumers more choice in where they access pension information. Multiple dashboards will help to meet the varied needs of the 24.5 million people with pensions and wealth. I am sure that this is a topic on which we will have extensive discussions prior to and during Committee.
The noble Lord, Lord Vaux, made the point that the payment of dividends will not be a notifiable event. It would be disproportionate to require every dividend payment to be notified to the regulator. Hindering dividend payments could affect pension schemes, as many are shareholders in companies with DB schemes.
The noble Lord also raised the Dutch scheme. Despite communication issues in Holland, for generations the Dutch scheme worked as though it were a DB scheme. Where adjustments needed to be made, these came as a surprise. We will ensure that in communications to members, particularly at key points throughout a member’s pension scheme journey—on joining and annually, and before and during retirement—CDC schemes are clear and transparent that benefit values may go down as well as up.
The noble Lord, Lord Vaux, asked what safeguards there are to ensure that transfer values are fair. The cash equivalent transfer value represents the actual calculated cash value of providing members’ benefits within the scheme. Legislation provides a framework for the calculation of transfer values that trustees must follow.
The noble Lord also asked why companies should not be stopped from paying dividends if their pension schemes are in deficit. We do not believe that it is sensible to stop companies paying dividends to shareholders, even when a scheme is in funding deficit. Government intervention to block dividend payments could discourage investors and weaken the business, further reducing the security of the defined benefit scheme.
The noble Lords, Lord Vaux and Lord Sharkey, and others raised a lot of questions on that subject. It is not that I am not trying to give an answer; it is just that I am unable to do so at the moment, but I will get back to them.
My noble friend Lady Altmann asked what the sanctions will be for pension scheme providers who do not comply with compulsion. If a pension scheme provider fails to comply, it might be subject to penalties, including fines. The regulator will have a range of powers, including issuing compliance notices, penalty notices and fines.
My noble friend also raised the question of simpler annual benefit statements. The industry delivery group will consider the outcome of the consultation on simpler statements when making recommendations on the information to be included on dashboards.
I pay tribute to my noble friend Lady Altmann, whose tenacity on net pay allowance and tax relief is legendary. She has taught me everything that I know about it. That was a matter raised also by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie. I am not trying to get out of anything here but it is a matter for the Treasury. However, the Government recognise the different impacts of the two systems. To date, it has not been possible to identify any straightforward or proportionate means to align the effects of net pay and relief at source. However, as announced in our manifesto, the Government will conduct a comprehensive review of how to fix this. We say that we will do it.
My noble friend Lady Altmann asked whether the new scheme’s funding requirements support the plumbing pension scheme. I am afraid that I am not able to give a response to that at the moment but I would love to meet her and give her the information that she requires, as well as making it available to other noble Lords.
I am taking a moment to look through my responses in an attempt to be fair to all noble Lords, although I do not think that I am doing a great job.
The noble Baroness, Lady Drake, raised the important point of carer’s credit and the family carer top-up. The Government recognise the valuable role of carers and the fact that they are disproportionately women. The Government Equalities Office gender equality road map, published in July 2019, set out plans to support carers. They included helping people to return to work after taking time out for caring. We are working closely with colleagues in the Money and Pensions Service to empower people to take informed decisions about saving throughout their lives. I am sure that we will revisit this very soon.
We have talked about the gender pay gap—a matter raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Drake and Lady Bryan. As I said, automatic enrolment has helped lots of women—I have given the statistics. We want to empower them to take informed decisions about saving throughout their life, but we have made progress in bridging the gap.
The noble Baroness, Lady Drake, talked about the consumer protection regime. The Government recognise that the regulation of dashboard providers is critical to maintaining public confidence. My department has
been working with HM Treasury and the FCA to decide how best to ensure that the regulatory regime is appropriate and robust.
The noble Baroness, Lady Drake, also raised the important issue of the security of data on pension dashboards. Ensuring the security of data is key to establishing consumer confidence in the dashboards. The Government are committed to ensuring that the infrastructure includes a level of identity assurance that satisfies the good practice established for national cybersecurity.
The noble Baroness, Lady Drake, and my noble friend Lady Noakes raised the subject of the Pensions Regulator. They questioned the impact of the new criminal offences and wondered whether their scope was too wide. We do not want to stop legitimate business activity, such as lenders taking security for normal financing activities. The Government are clear that businesses must be allowed to make the right decisions to allow them to develop and grow.
The majority of employers want to do right by their scheme. However, we must ensure that sufficient safeguards are in place to protect members’ pensions from the minority who are willing to put them at risk—I mention no names. The Government are committed to the Money and Pensions Service providing a dashboard, and MaPS committed to providing a dashboard in its 2019-20 business plan.
I turn to the contribution of my noble friend Lord Young. His powers of foresight are legendary; I am envious, and I am sure that many in both Houses would like to have them. The same is true of his oratory powers; he is very eloquent and his Front-Bench contributions are much missed in this House. We will meet before Committee. Time is really getting on now. I will respond directly to my noble friend Lord Young on the points he raised, and will have an answer to the point raised by my noble friend Lord Flight on equity release.
My noble friend Lady Noakes asked whether there are adequate appeal processes. The answer is yes and I would be very happy to talk her through those at a later time. Her description of a “half-baked dashboard” is interesting. We undertook a significant consultation and got more than 120 responses. These were published in April 2019 and were taken into account during the development of the legislation. We will continue to seek all views as we develop regulations.
The noble Baroness, Lady Donaghy, raised a point about holders of multiple part-time jobs. Currently, where an individual does not earn more than £10,000 per annum in a single job but earns more than the lower limit of the automatic enrolment qualifying earnings band, they can opt in to a scheme in one job and receive the mandatory pension contribution from their employer on earnings over that level.
The noble Baronesses, Lady Hayman and Lady Jones of Whitchurch, talked about climate change. This is a subject close to our hearts and I will meet with them both to talk in more detail. The Government are absolutely committed to tackling climate change and recognise the concerns that have been raised. We have already introduced legislation to require pension schemes to state their policy. In building on this, the DWP continues to work with the industry.
On dashboards, we expect that initially there will be no more information than is already available; to start with, simple information will become available. The delivery group may make recommendations for adding more detailed information as the needs and interactions of users develop.