Pensions can be a “hot potato” at the best of times and it’s not always easy to own up to being a pensions lawyer. Whenever pensions hit the news headlines, it’s time to put on a tin hat.

The trouble is, that despite the fact everyone knows pensions is a serious business and we all have good intentions to make things better, nobody can ever quite agree on how we should go about making that happen. Why else would we have had so many consultations over the last 20 years or so about, let’s face it, the same sort of issues?

We tie ourselves in knots trying to work out the answer to questions such as, are we saving enough, are we investing in the right things, do we get good value for it, do we understand our options, and (my current personal favourite) how can we get good outcomes at retirement? The same points keep cropping up under different guises, yet still most people don’t “get” what pensions are all about. A quick look at the results of the FCA’s recent Financial Lives survey tells us that.

But what if we were to gather a bunch of pensions professionals around the kitchen table today for a good old chinwag about the state of the DC pensions universe? I bet they’d have a lot to say right now.

It appears, at least to me, that the Government is working on the basis that the UK is facing a very challenging investment problem that requires a speedy investment solution. I give you Exhibit A and Exhibit B – the Pensions Investment Review and the consultation response to Unlocking the UK Pensions Market for Growth published by HM Treasury on 29 May, as well as Exhibit C – the Pension Schemes Bill, laid in Parliament on 5 June.

Clearly, hours of work and huge amounts of collective effort goes into the creation of new pensions policies. There will be arguments that go both ways on whether these will give the Government the right tools that it needs to meet that challenge, and it’s not our job to comment on the politics involved.

But if we were to ask around that kitchen table, I suspect there would be a good many people who are worried about making sure that the “pensions” part of the discussion doesn’t get lost in the rush to fix the “investment” problem. Without wishing to sound too much like a lawyer, Exhibits A and B raise a lot of pensions questions that are currently unanswered. Luckily, the Government is going to consult on some of the details. And that’s a good thing because there are some important discussions of principle to be had. Here is a starter for ten.

• how should we describe what a “main default arrangement” is, so that it is flexible enough to evolve alongside the inevitable future changes in investment practices and needs?
• whose decision will it be – provider or trustee – to choose which main default arrangement is right for which groups of members?
• how can and how should providers and trustees “proactively consider consolidation” into the main default arrangement – especially if there are guarantees or DB underpins, or restrictive scheme rules to contend with which have prevented consolidation to date?
• whether it would be better if the “independent person” who gives the green light to override the contractual rights of savers should be an actuary, an IGC or someone else? And what are the implications of this, in terms of the scope of and resourcing of those roles?
• and, really importantly, how can we ensure that when contract schemes consolidate into master trusts, moving vulnerable customers out of the ambit of the FCA’s Consumer Duty into the world of occupational pension scheme trustees, that those vulnerable people can continue to be protected in their new home?

In short, there will be much to discuss in the coming weeks and months. We will all need to bring our thinking caps along when we work through how they will operate in practice. Shall I put the kettle on?