The Irish Department of Social Protection has outlined plans to develop policy positions on updates to the auto-enrolment vehicle, MyFutureFund, for the medium term.

In an update on MyFutureFund, which launched at the beginning of this year, Irish Minister for Social Protection, Dara Calleary TD, revealed that over 763,000 employees working for 104,000 employers had been automatically enrolled.

More than €60m of contributions have been invested with the three contracted investment managers to date.

As part of auto-enrolment, the National Automatic Retirement Savings Authority (NAERSA) was established to ensure supports are in place to regulate and operate MyFutureFund.

NAERSA will continue to engage and support employers who are yet to register with the fund, and ensure they are compliant with their legal obligations.

In the medium term, the Department of Social Protection will work with NAERSA to develop policy positions on various aspects of MyFutureFund.

These included facilitating additional voluntary contributions and the transfer of existing pots into MyFutureFund.

It also planned to establish policy positions on developing drawdown options for when people reach retirement age, and examine whether it could be possible to extend the scheme to others.

“MyFutureFund is truly revolutionary in terms of pensions for Ireland,” Calleary stated.

“It will benefit so many hardworking people over the coming years and decades, making sure they have more money in retirement than they otherwise would.

“This positive outcome is reflective of the huge effort made by my department and other stakeholders in advance of the launch of MyFutureFund, including employers and payroll providers, and I’d like to thank all of those for their intense engagement and diligent cooperation with us over that time.

“I am extremely proud as Minister for Social Protection to have delivered this transformative change.”

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