The City and County of Swansea, as the Administering Authority of the City and County of Swansea Pension Fund is required:
- To make arrangements for the proper administration of the financial affairs of the Pension Fund and to secure that one of its officers has the responsibility for the administration of those affairs.
- To manage its affairs in an economic, efficient and effective manner and to safeguard its assets.
Pension Board
In accordance with the LGPS Governance Regulations 2015, a Pension Board was introduced from 1 April 2015 to ensure effective governance and administration of the Scheme is represented at a local level.
The Local Pension Board will be an oversight body and will be responsible for assisting the City and County of Swansea, as Scheme Manager, to:
- secure compliance with the Regulations, any other legislation relating to the governance and administration of the Scheme, and requirements imposed by the Pensions Regulator in relation to the Scheme and;
- to ensure the effective and efficient governance and administration of the Scheme.
Pension Fund Committee
The Pensions Fund Committee has responsibility for all matters relating to the management and administration of the City and County of Swansea Pension Fund.
The Committee meets formally at least quarterly and is supported by the advice of two independent advisors. After taking account of the views of its independent advisers and appointed actuary, it is responsible for determining the investment strategy and policy, with appointed professional fund managers undertaking the operational management of the assets.
The Committee has agreed a number of policy documents for the fund. These are revised as appropriate and the latest versions can be accessed below, together with the Fund’s Annual and Actuarial Valuation reports.
Pooling of Investments
At the Summer Budget 2015, it was announced that the Government will work with Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS) administering authorities to reform how LGPS investments are managed in England and Wales.
The 91 LGPS pension funds in England and Wales have commenced the exercise of pooling their assets into eight investment pools in an effort to drive down investment costs and enable funds to develop the capacity and capability to become leaders in infrastructure investment and help drive growth in the UK economy.
The expectation is that the new investment pools will begin to be used for collective investments from 1st April 2018 onwards.
The City and County of Swansea Pension Fund has been working in collaboration with the other 7 local government pension funds in Wales.
A proposal on working together in Wales was submitted to Central Government and the response received was to continue developing the plan. A more detailed submission was made in July and a response is awaited. Work continues to design the governance and structure of the pool. A link to the submission is listed below.
