Pensions Regulator announces its oversight of professional trustees

On April 2, 2025, Nausicaa Delfas, chief executive at the Regulator, announced a new framework for professional trustee oversight in a speech at the Trades Union Congress pensions conference.

The framework is one element of the Regulator's move to a more prudential style of regulation, allowing it to address risks at a systemic and scheme level. Its decision making is informed through evidence gathering from 11 of the biggest trustee firms, which revealed that these firms operated a variety of business models in the market, and that they had seen a significant expansion in the number of professional trustees.

The Regulator also confirmed that it had prepared a market oversight report exploring some of the areas where risks to saver outcomes could arise. These included:

• Sole trusteeship
• Relationships with employers
• In-house advisers
• The scheme decision maker

The Regulator's Market Oversight Team will establish "ongoing supervisory relationships" with professional trustee firms, beginning in summer 2025, and cover the remaining firms by the end of the year. Commenting on this initiative, Delfas said:

"The professional trustee industry has experienced significant growth over the last few years, with more than half of UK schemes using a professional or sole trustee. As part of our new risk-based and outcome-focused approach to regulation, we are extending our engagement with these firms to identify and mitigate any risks to pension savers."