The Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute has qualified as positive the content of the White Paper of the European Commission entitled “An agenda for adequate, sustainable and secure pensions” and considers that it puts forward questions of great importance in order to ensure the future of pensions in Europe.
The Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute has qualified as positive the content of the White Paper of the European Commission entitled “An agenda for adequate, sustainable and secure pensions” and considers that it puts forward questions of great importance in order to ensure the future of pensions in Europe. It also indicates that the framework established by the European Commission coincides with the lines of the recommendations that the Forum of Experts of the Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute highlighted in its first report entitled “The reform of public pensions”.
Guillermo de la Dehesa, chairman of Aviva España and chairman of the Forum of Experts of the Aviva Institute, considers that: “The time has come to give a completely new focus – an agreement between the European Commission, member countries and the insurance sector, for the purposes of promoting a more thorough culture of savings. The White Paper is a positive step in the right direction, but firm action needs to be taken quickly.”
De la Dehesa added that: “Changing people’s attitudes to savings and helping them to better understand the financial decisions they need to take, are the aims defended by the Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute, and we are very satisfied to see that the European Commission shares this focus.”
Among the initiatives of the White Paper, the Commission invites a review of good practices on the subject of retirement pensions, with the aim of providing better information to individuals when planning their retirement.
In this sense, Ignacio Izquierdo, managing director of Aviva, states that: “Last November, Aviva published a report entitled 'Towards an annual pensions report in the European Union' in which he stated how awareness of what people hope to receive in their retirement would lead them to think of their planning for retirement. With this in mind, we are convinced that to provide an annual report on pensions would result in consumers taking measures.
"All European citizens should receive a single annual report allowing them to estimate the income they would receive as they face retirement, and this includes public, employment and private pensions. We are leading the European Commission, Member States and the insurance industry to work together to establish minimum standards in the annual pension reports and avoid a situation in which citizens receive misleading information.”
The initiatives of the White Paper establish a rise in quality of retirement products of the third pillar, which the Commission will present before 2013. This initiative also claims to improve information to consumers and protection standards by means of voluntary Codes, as well as the possible design of European certification for this type of products.
Izquierdo states that: “Aviva entirely shares this vision, and in fact it has already recommended, in its study entitled 'A significant deficit', the creation of a single quality standard for pensions in Europe, so as to thereby re-establish consumer confidence in the different prevision products.”
Details follow of the reports drawn up by the Forum of Experts of the Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute and by Aviva within the framework of pensions, as well as the White Paper:
Notes:
- The Forum of Experts of the Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute drew up the report entitled “The Reform of Pensions” after its meeting on 19 October 2011. José Ignacio Conde-Ruíz, Juan José Dolado, Rafael Doménech, José Antonio Herce and César Molinas attended this meeting to engage in a thorough debate on the reform of the public pensions system as a consequence of the approval in Congress of the “Law on the updating, adjustment and modernisation of the Social Security system”. The report details the evaluation of the reform and the recommendations of the members of the Forum of Experts to the government and citizens. This report is available on the website of the Aviva Institute, in the section Foro de Expertos Informes de Conclusiones (Forum of Experts, Reports of Conclusions).
- In the year 2010, Aviva calculated that the annual pensions deficit – the difference between the quantity of money that people will need upon retirement between 2011 and 2051 in order to maintain an adequate standard of living after retirement, and what they will receive from public and private pensions - stands at approximately €1.9 billion. This report is available on the website of the Aviva Institute, in the section Investigación sobre el déficit en las pensiones (Research on the pensions deficit).
- The same study calculated that in Spain, an extra €170,000 million need to be saved every year in order to maintain the standard of living after retirement (according to data of the OECD). A copy is available for downloading in the aforesaid section of the website of the Aviva Institute, Investigación sobre el déficit en las pensiones
- The last of the Aviva reports of the series entitled “A significant deficit”, published last November and edited “Towards an Annual Pensions Report in the European Union”, revealed how awareness on what people hope to receive in retirement would lead individuals to think about their retirement strategy. A copy is available for downloading at www.aviva.com/europepensionsgap.
- The White Paper of the European Commission, as well as the press note, are available on the website of the Aviva Institute in its section entitled Saber más - Biblioteca.
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For more information please contact:
Beatriz Egido Requejo
Telephone: +34 91 556 01 54
Email: beatriz.egido@edelman.com
Laura Villuendas
Telephone: +34 91 297 18 17 / +34 696 576 921
Email: laura.villuendas@aviva.es
Notes to editors:
The Aviva Savings and Pensions Institute is a platform of research and debate created by Aviva, the leading European life insurance and pensions group. Its major objective is to promote the debate on the problem of sustainable savings, and to indicate two key areas of action: to help people to understand their financial decisions, and promote collective collaboration in order to change consumer attitudes to long-term savings.
The cornerstone of the Institute consists of a Forum of Experts including seven professionals and researchers of the world of economics and pensions, chaired by Guillermo de la Dehesa. The activity of the Institute is supported in three areas of action: research and reflection work of the Forum of Experts, the generation of periodical studies on the subject of pensions and long-term savings, and the development of tools for analysis, assistance and consultancy for citizens.