Relaunch of the Pensions Commission to encourage saving

On July 21, 2025, the Government announced the re-introduction of the Pensions Commission in a drive to boost pension saving. The relaunched Commission will explore the barriers that stop people from saving enough for retirement, with a final report due in 2027. 

The original Commission of 2006 was a “huge success”, enabling the roll-out of auto-enrolment, resulting in 88 per cent of eligible employees are now saving, up from 55 per cent in 2012. 

The revived Commission will:

• Consider the long-term future of the pensions system, in order to make millions of “workers better off in retirement”.
• Examine why tomorrow’s pensioners are on track to be poorer than today’s.
• Make recommendations for change, looking at what is required to build a future-proof pensions system that is “strong, fair and sustainable”. 

According to Government analysis, the incomes of retirees are set to fall over the next few decades if nothing changes, with 45 per cent of working age adults saving nothing at all into a pension, and with lower earners, the self-employed and some ethnic minorities particularly at risk.

Alongside the Commission’s terms of reference, also published were a policy paper assessing the state of Britain’s pensions landscape, the results of a survey on “Planning and preparing for later life” and analysis of future pension incomes. 

The DWP's relaunch of the Pensions Commission has been generally welcomed as a means of addressing the current “retirement crisis”. There appear to be three broad areas of concern: whether to raise the minimum level of auto-enrolment contributions; the pensions of groups at risk of poor outcomes; and the need to address the state pension age, which, as noted below, is undergoing its third review.

The latest State Pension Age Review was launched on July 21, 2025, commissioning two independent reports for consideration when deciding the state pension age for future decades.