Pensions Age Winter Conference: Out of the cold
The essential event to help pension schemes and the industry to stay on track
Thursday 7 December 2006, Royal Institute of British Architects, 66 Portland Place, London W1B 1AD

Topics include:

• Age discrimination
• Trustee Knowledge and Understanding (TKU)
• The Sponsor Covenant
• Liability Driven Investment (LDI)
• Managing your PPF levy
• Scheme funding
• Property investment
• SIPPs
• Risk management
• Administration challenges
• The Pensions Regulator requirements
• Pension reform

Speakers include:

• James Purnell MP, Minister of State for Pensions Reform, DWP
• Phillip Hammond, Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
• Partha Dasgupta, Chief Executive of the PPF
• June Mulroy, Executive Director of Business Delivery, The Pensions Regulator
• Richard Hall, Head of Pensions Services, Standard & Poor's
• Ian Bell, Partner, Baker Tilly
• Robert Branagh, Client Services Director, Paymaster
• Richard Graham, Head of Institutional Sales, Business Development and Client Service, Baring Asset Management
• John Moret, Head of Sales and Marketing, Suffolk Life
• Nick Cooper, Head of Global Real Estate Multi-Manager, ING Real Estate
• Matthew Swynnerton, partner, DLA Piper
• Roger Cobley, Immediate Past President of The Pensions Management Institute (PMI) and chairman of Stamford Associates (Chairman for the event)
  
  

Keynote speaker: James Purnell MP, Minister of State for Pensions Reform, DWP
James Purnell MP began his political career as researcher to Rt. Hon. Tony Blair MP during his time as Shadow Employment Secretary, 1989-92. After graduating, he went to Hydra Associates 1992-94, and then became a Research Fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Research 1994-95 on their media and communications project.

He went on to become head of corporate planning at the BBC from 1995-97. He then returned to work for the Prime Minister Tony Blair as special adviser on culture, media, sport and the knowledge economy from 1997-2001.

He was selected for the seat of Stalybridge and Hyde in 2001, and went on to win the election with a majority of 8,859. As a Labour Member of Parliament, he was a member of the Work and Pensions Select Committee in the House of Commons 2001-03, and the Chair of the All Party Group on Private Equity and Venture Capital 2002-03.

In 2003 James became Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to Rt. Hon. Ruth Kelly MP in the cabinet office, and in December 2004 he joined the government as an assistant whip. In May 2005 he became Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and this year he became Minister of State for Pensions Reform at the Department of Work and Pensions.

Keynote speaker: Phillip Hammond, Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Philip has been a Member of Parliament representing Runnymede and Weybridge since 1997. Philip was Secretary of the Conservative Party Health Committee and has also served as a member of the Select Committee for Environment, Transport and the Regions and the Trade & Industry Select Committee.

In June 1998, Philip was appointed to the Opposition Front Bench as Shadow Minister for Health. In September 2001, he was appointed Shadow Trade & Industry Minister with the additional role of Shadow Minister for Small Business.

From 2002 to 2005, he was Shadow Minister for Local Government. In this role Philip was responsible for developing Conservative Party policy on local government finance (including council tax), the Fire and Rescue Service and traveller management.

In May 2005, he became the Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Since December 2005, Philip has served as the Shadow Secretary of State for Work & Pensions.

Keynote speaker: Partha Dasgupta, chief executive of the Pension Protection Fund (PPF)
Partha Dasgupta was appointed chief executive of the Pension Protection Fund (PPF) on 22 June 2006.
He originally joined the PPF in January 2005 as director of investment and finance where he led the development of the risk-based levy and had responsibility for overseeing the investments, finances and
levy arrangements.

Prior to joining the PPF, Partha spent ten years at Barclays Global Investors most recently as managing director, fixed income Europe. He held a number of senior positions at Barclays Global Investors covering areas such as portfolio management, trading, investment strategy, business management and product development.

Keynote speaker: June Mulroy, Executive Director of Business Delivery, The Pensions Regulator
June Mulroy is the Pensions Regulator's . This is the core operational function of the organisation, with responsibility for capturing scheme information, mitigating risks to scheme members' benefits and promoting better administration of pension schemes. An ex-psychologist and chartered accountant, June worked in large corporates and in banking for over 17 years as a dealer/risk analysis specialist and consultant.

Recognising the strong element of change management in all her previous roles, she moved into the NHS and worked in two acute Trusts, one of which was the 'flagship' of the NHS at the time, Chelsea and Westminster Hospital. Since then she has worked in Switzerland and Paris, the latter being for the UN in UNESCO.

Richard Hall, head of pensions services, Standard & Poor's
Richard Hall is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries and prior to joining Standard & Poor’s worked for both Watson Wyatt and Mercer HR Consulting as an actuarial consultant. He has over 11 years of experience in the pensions consulting sector, having provided actuarial and consulting services to a wide range of clients.

In his current role, Richard is responsible for the strategy and design of Standard & Poor’s pension services, providing sponsor covenant analysis to clients ranging from small companies to large multinationals. Richard also participated on the Sponsor Covenant Working Party of the Institute of Actuaries.

Ian Bell, Partner, Baker Tilly
Ian Bell is based in Baker Tilly’s Crawley office where he has been a partner since 1997. He has worked extensively with pension schemes for a number of years and currently acts as Audit partner for over 60 pension clients who include Honeywell, Group 4 Securicor, Skanska, Akzo Nobel, and Honda UK.

Ian also heads up Baker Tilly’s award winning Pensions Group and he is responsible for the development and performance of that group nationally. He was instrumental in developing our Risk Management Toolkit for pension scheme trustees in 2004 and has since run many of these sessions for trustee boards across the country.
He is also a trustee of our own defined benefit pension scheme and therefore has first hand experience of the growing number of issues faced by Trustee Boards in undertaking their duties.

Robert Branagh, Client Services Director, Paymaster
Robert has over 12 years experience in the Pensions industry across a variety of disciplines. He began his consulting career working as an Employee Benefits consultant for a major Lloyd’s brokerage. In 1990 he joined Grant Thornton Chartered Accountants as a consultant in its pension department to provide pensions advice to audit, insolvency and tax clients of the firm. In 1996, Robert left to establish a Third Party Administration (TPA) operation for a London insurance company and firm of Independent Pension Trustees. Before joining Paymaster in February 1999, Robert spent a year as Operations Manager in the Pensions Administration division for Watson Wyatt Partners. Robert qualified as an Associate of the Pensions Management Institute (PMI) in 1994 and since then has been a correspondence course tutor and an examiner for the Institute.

He was elected a Fellow of the Institute in September 2000. Robert is Membership Secretary and Treasurer to the PMI Southern Group and serves on the PMI sub-committee on the Qualification in Pensions Administration. He also serves on the Society of Pension Consultants (SPC) Administration sub-committee.

Richard Graham, head of institutional sales, business development and client service, Baring Asset
Management
Richard Graham has run the Institutional Sales and Client Service team based in London since 2003. This includes responsibility for LDI solutions for pension funds. He was previously a director on the Asset Allocation team and head of institutional marketing. Richard joined Barings PLC in 1993 to open the Shanghai office as group chief representative China. He became a director (Institutional Group) in 1995 and returned to London as product specialist for Emerging Markets, later European and then Global Equities.

Richard is also Chairman of the IFSL Pensions Group. He previously worked with the Swire Group and HM Diplomatic Service, latterly as British trade commissioner China, and was chairman of the British Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai.

John Moret, Head of Sales and Marketing, Suffolk Life
John has led the development of SIPPs since their launch in 1990. He joined Suffolk Life in 2004 from Capita PPML, the second biggest administrator of SIPPs, where he was Executive Chairman / Managing Director for four and a half years. He has worked in the pensions and financial services sector for over
thirty years.

Nick Cooper, Head of Global Real Estate Multi-Manager, ING Real Estate
Nick Cooper spearheaded the launch of ING REIM’s Multi-Manager service some five years ago. His team manages investment into primarily unlisted real estate funds and now manages in excess of GBP 2 billion, including the UK’s largest property fund of funds – Osiris (currently over GBP 400 million). Nick has been with ING Real Estate for over 16 years and is a member of the company’s Global Board. In previous years, he set up and managed a number of direct property funds including Lionbrook, ING Covent Garden and the ING Residential Fund. He was also ING’s lead manager for Abu Dhabi Investment Authority across Continental Europe.

Matthew Swynnerton, partner, DLA Piper
Matthew has specialised in pensions law since joining DLA Piper's pensions department in March 1998. Matthew advises on all aspects of pensions law including simplification, the pension aspects of corporate transactions, scheme re-documentation, advising trustees and employers on Pensions Act 1995/2004 compliance issues and advising on company reconstructions and scheme mergers.

In addition, Matthew is a Secretary of DLA Piper's independent trustee company and therefore has practical experience of the day to day issues frequently faced by trustees. Matthew is also Secretary of the Education and Seminars sub-committee of the Association of Pension Lawyers, where he is involved in running technical seminars, and has been Chairman of another APL sub-committee since 1999, regularly organising and delivering seminars for its members.

Chairman for the event: Roger Cobley, immediate past president of The Pensions Management Institute (PMI) and chairman of Stamford Associates
Roger Cobley has spent his entire career working in pensions. After working for two insurance companies, he became an international benefits consultant with Martin Paterson Associates (now part of Buck Consultants), and then worked for Rank Xerox as international benefits Manager.

Roger moved back into consulting as manager, international consulting with Mercer, and finally became international benefits director for Fisons plc. He is now the chairman of Stamford Associates Limited, chairman of the trustee board of three pension funds and a member of the investment sub-committee of another major fund. He is chairman of the independent pension trustee group, and has currently been appointed to the Accounting Standards Board Pensions Advisory Panel to review the operation of FRS 17, the accounting standard for pensions. He was elected President of the PMI in 2003. His two year term of office ended in July 2005.