Ireland's Pensions Authority is adopting a “forward-looking-risk-based approach” to supervision, it has revealed.

Publishing a statement, it said that as part of this it is undertaking an engagement programme to asses how schemes are meeting their governance and risk obligations.

The engagement programme will initially focus on some large defined benefit and defined contribution multi-employer schemes and will comprise of a questionnaire, which will then provide the basis for a meeting between trustees and the authority.

This will then be followed up with a findings report including the authority’s observations and, where appropriate, recommendations for improvement.

The authority said the questionnaire will enable it to assess a scheme’s governance standards and how this may impact on good member outcomes.

The questionnaire will also, where appropriate, enable the authority to assess how well a scheme meets the proposed requirements for master trusts as published by the authority in June 2019 and other requirements of the IORP II Directive, once this has been transposed into law.

Commenting, Pensions Authority, head of supervision and enforcement, Grace Guy, said: “The Pensions Authority is committed to improving member outcomes by implementing a forward looking and risk based approach to supervision.

"This will involve more direct engagement with trustees involving dialogue and scrutiny about how well they are exercising their responsibilities to their members. This programme is the first step in a process that will be extended to all schemes.”

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