On 19 July the Government announced Royal Assent to the Finance Act 2007 [PDF]; a web version is also available. By tradition, Explanatory Notes are never provided for Finance Acts, although Notes to the Bill as originally presented to Parliament on 29 March are available. Successive versions of the Bill published during its passage through Parliament are also accessible via the 2007 Finance page. The last amendments concerning pensions were reported here on 22 May 2007.

Pensions legislation is to be found in Part 4 (sections 68 - 70) and Schedules 18 - 20 of the Act. Aries Pensions System users will find a summary of all these new provisions in a special section of the latest update (v9.5)*. If you don’t have access, please contact Aries for further information.

* The July 2007 update to the Aries Pensions System includes:

1. Finance Bill 2007: a new module providing a handy summary of the changes contained in what is now the Finance Act 2007.

2. RPSM Browser: all sections of the RPSM, including the Member, Administrator and Employer pages, are now available in a single fully-searchable document.

3. Occupational Pension Schemes Taxation: a new section summarising the Post April 06 taxation regs, ie. in contrast with those prevailing before that date.

4. Winding-up: thoroughly revised, to reflect the various interactions of winding up with TPR, the PPF and the Employer Debt regulations.

5. Guide to Statutory Instruments: summaries of 19 further SIs, on Taxation, Scheme Funding, Cross-Border Activities, FAS and other subjects, extending this section of Aries to cover about 600 key pensions SIs.