11 November 2016

Investment & Pensions Europe: Belgian pension fund association decries government's workplace plan

Belgium’s pension fund association has added its voice to concerns over a government proposal for personal workplace pensions, calling for the “specificity” of the different pension pillars to be respected.

The government last month announced that, as of 2018, all employees should be able to save for a second-pillar pension even if their employer does not offer this opportunity.

Under the government proposal, an individual could, on his or her own initiative, decide to contribute part of his/her salary to a pension, and the tax benefits would be the same as those applicable to contributions into pension schemes set up by employers.

PensioPlus, the country’s pension fund association, said it was worried about the possible impact on the second pillar.

Its reaction to the government’s ideas, made public this week, comes after the academic pensions council earlier this month raised the alarm over the reform plan, saying it represented a “dangerous” move towards “individualisation”.

Pensions minister Daniel Bacquelaine in turn responded by saying he was “astonished” the council was “contesting the right of an employee to freely build a complementary pension in the second pillar”.

Bacquelaine said he nonetheless intended to modify this right so it could better address “the reality” as concerns complementary pensions in Belgium, and that the details were still to be developed.

PensioPlus said the minister should submit his proposal to the national labour council for its opinion if he intends to follow through with his idea to allow workplace personal pensions.

“PensioPlus considers that a ‘voluntary’ individual pension for an employee does not fall under the remit of the second pillar and reminds the pensions minister that the ‘specificity’ of each pension pillar needs to be respected,” it said in a statement.

Personal pensions need to be addressed through supplementary pensions in the third pillar, which is the general definition applied by the OECD, it added.

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