A new law is needed to protect workers' savings held by companies that provide auto-enrolment pension schemes, a minister has said.

Fears that dozens of companies providing these pensions are too small to survive were explored in a recent BBC investigation. Now Pensions Minister Ros Altmann has told MPs that legislation is needed to "ensure proper protection" for savers. She said that she was pushing for a slot for a law to be proposed. "We know that doing nothing is not an option," she told the Work and Pensions Select Committee.

Savings at risk

Workers are being automatically enrolled into a workplace pension by employers in a rolling programme set out by the government, although employees are free to opt out. So-called Master Trust schemes, which manage pensions, are popular with the 1.8 million small employers with fewer than 30 staff who are currently signing up staff under the auto-enrolment programme. Only five have some kind of kitemark, and The Pensions Regulator told the BBC that there was a risk that some of the smaller schemes might not survive, putting savers' money at risk......Read more here