The trustees of the Dunnes Stores defined contribution pension scheme have been replaced by The Pensions Regulator (TPR) to protect savers.

The Northern Irish high street retailer’s trustees have been stopped from running the Dunnes Stores (Bangor) Limited Management Pension Scheme “following a catalogue of governance failures”.

An independent trustee has been appointed by TPR after the previous trustees were found to lack the knowledge and understanding to effectively govern the scheme.

This is the first time that TPR has had to appoint a trustee primarily due to a trustee board’s incompetence.

Commenting on the announcement, TPR executive director of frontline regulation, Nicola Parish, said: “We will not stand by when trustee incompetence threatens the retirement outcomes of workplace pension savers.

“In this case, the trustees put member outcomes at risk and so we took action to ensure benefits are protected. The trustees have been replaced because they have consistently failed to show they had the skill to do the job properly.”

Following an investigation and a referral to the Determinations Panel, TPR found that the employer nominated trustees had “failed to familiarise themselves with the requirements of UK pensions legislation”, despite running the scheme for more than a decade.

The existing trustees had reportedly failed to satisfactorily engage with TPR and did not address a governance concerns raised by TPR on a number of occasions.

TPR said that the trustees “do not have, or are not exercising, their knowledge and understanding for the proper administration of the scheme”, and when errors were identified, they made little attempt to rectify them.

Parish concluded: “Trustees who are not committed to their duties should consider whether it’s right that they continue in their position of being responsible for governing a pension scheme.”

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