ICAS ICAS logo

Quicklinks

  1. About Us

    Find out about who we are and what we do here at ICAS.

  2. Find a CA

    Search our directory of individual CAs and Member organisations by name, location and professional criteria.

  3. CA Magazine

    View the latest issues of the dedicated magazine for ICAS Chartered Accountants.

  4. Contact Us

    Get in touch with ICAS by phone, email or post, with dedicated contacts for Members, Students and firms.

Login
  • Annual renewal
  • About us
  • Contact us
  • Find a CA
  1. About us
    1. Governance
  2. Members
    1. Become a member
    2. Newly qualified
    3. Manage my membership
    4. Benefits of membership
    5. Careers support
    6. Mentoring
    7. CA Wellbeing
    8. More for Members
    9. Area networks
    10. International communities
    11. Get involved
    12. Top Young CAs
    13. Career breaks
    14. ICAS podcast
    15. Newly admitted members 2022
    16. Newly admitted members 2023
  3. CA Students
    1. Student information
    2. Student resources
    3. Learning requirements
    4. Learning updates
    5. Learning blog
    6. Totum Pro | Student discount card
    7. CA Student wellbeing
  4. Become a CA
    1. How to become a CA
    2. Routes to becoming a CA
    3. CA Stories
    4. Find a training agreement
    5. Why become a CA
    6. Qualification information
    7. University exemptions
  5. Employers
    1. Become an Authorised Training Office
    2. Resources for Authorised Training Offices
    3. Professional entry
    4. Apprenticeships
  6. Find a CA
  7. ICAS events
    1. CA Summit
  8. CA magazine
  9. Insight
    1. Finance + Trust
    2. Finance + Technology
    3. Finance + EDI
    4. Finance + Mental Fitness
    5. Finance + Leadership
    6. Finance + Sustainability
  10. Professional resources
    1. Anti-money laundering
    2. Audit and assurance
    3. Brexit
    4. Business and governance
    5. Charities
    6. Coronavirus
    7. Corporate and financial reporting
    8. Cyber security
    9. Ethics
    10. Insolvency
    11. ICAS Research
    12. Pensions
    13. Practice
    14. Public sector
    15. Sustainability
    16. Tax
  11. CPD - professional development
    1. CPD courses and qualifications
    2. CPD news and updates
    3. CPD support and advice
  12. Regulation
    1. Complaints and sanctions
    2. Regulatory authorisations
    3. Guidance and help sheets
    4. Regulatory monitoring
  13. CA jobs
    1. CA jobs partner: Rutherford Cross
    2. Resources for your job search
    3. Advertise with CA jobs
    4. Hays | A Trusted ICAS CA Jobs Partner
    5. Azets | What's your ambition?
  14. Work at ICAS
    1. Business centres
    2. Meet our team
    3. Benefits
    4. Vacancies
    5. Imagine your career at ICAS
  15. Contact us
    1. Technical and regulation queries
    2. ICAS logo request

ICAS Pensions Panel

Conferce crowd listening to speaker

The ICAS Pensions Panel represents ICAS on matters impacting on pension provision and the pensions industry, in relation to:

  • Public policy
  • Law, regulation and governance
  • Financial reporting
  • Auditing and assurance

The Panel's key policy positions are as follows:

  • The UK Government should consider setting up an independent pensions/ retirement savings commission as a standing advisory body which seeks to achieve long-term stability for the UK pension system and cross-party consensus.
  • In the context of debates around constitutional reform, support for a unified UK savings market, including pension saving - and for financial services and pension law and regulation remaining a UK matter, as should pension protection arrangements.
  • Support in principle for UK government plans to move forward with a legal and regulatory regime for collective defined contribution pension schemes, a model designed to enable genuine risk sharing among scheme members.
  • Savers, employers, trustees and governance committee members should have access to information which enables them to assess whether defined contribution pension products are delivering good outcomes.
  • Support for a legal and regulatory environment which encourages providers of pension decumulation products to bring new products to the market with confidence that these will be able to operate without change over the long-term.
  • Master trusts must develop and maintain governance arrangements which are fit for purpose and support good member outcomes for auto-enrolled savers.

Panel Members

Matt Cooper (Chair)

Matt was appointed Chair of the ICAS Pensions Panel in December 2018. He is a director at PwC and leads PwC's employer covenant advisory team in Scotland. He is a CA (2005 qualified) and has been advising corporates and trustees with defined benefit pension schemes since 2007. His client base has included over 50 pension schemes with assets ranging from £4m to £20bn. Areas of advice he provides include ongoing scheme funding and contribution affordability, covenant monitoring, contingency planning, moral hazard risk, pension-driven restructuring and the assessment of potential detriment as a result of corporate transactions.

He has developed areas of specialism including Banking and Utility companies, having worked closely with clients in these sectors. In particular how the funding of pension schemes interacts with the other regulated industries as defined by FCA/PRA and Ofgem respectively. He is also part of PwC's team focusing on the adoption of integrated risk management, in particular how this can be demonstrated for small and medium-sized schemes.

Before specialising in pensions, Matt had broad experience including corporate audit, due diligence, and a 9-month secondment the strategic business services team at Clydesdale Bank.


Andy Scott

Andy is an experienced former actuary, independent trustee and investment consultant, who advised and worked with Trustees, Employers, Regulatory bodies and other advisers for over 30 years on all aspects of DB and DC schemes.

He has also represented scheme members in litigation cases and was involved in founding the Pension Protection Fund and Financial Assistance Scheme. Now solely a professional independent trustee, Andy seeks to utilise the wealth of experience and knowledge he has built up in the above roles to chair, assist and add value to trustee boards.


Anne Kershaw

Anne is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries and is an Associate Director with Muse Advisory. Prior to joining Muse, she was a Worldwide Partner at Mercer where her last responsibility was leading the Scottish investment consulting team. Other senior roles held at Mercer include leading the retirement consulting business in Ireland.

Throughout her career, Anne has gained extensive experience of consulting with a wide range of trustee and corporate clients, helping them meet the challenges they face in managing their investment, funding and governance responsibilities. She is an independent trustee director (in a personal capacity) of the Scottish & Newcastle Pension Plan and chairs its Investment Committee. In addition, Anne is an independent trustee of the Mercer Mastertrust.


Brian Mackie

Brian has broadly-based Chief Financial Officer/ Chief Operating Officer with over 25 years experience in multi-national consumer goods businesses, covering private equity, new start-ups, joint ventures, co-operatives, family business and public company situations.

He has comprehensive experience across all areas of corporate finance, accounting, strategy, planning, tax, treasury, pensions, HR, IT and legal.  He also has very strong experience in Mergers & Acquisitions, private equity, debt financing and a restructuring track record, covering acquisitions, disposals, restructurings/ closures and turnaround situations.

He is skilled in multi-cultural stakeholder management in joint-venture structures and has highly developed skills in IFRS Accounting Standards, tax, treasury, pensions and IT.  Brian also has operational experience with direct general management and commercial responsibility for overseas subsidiaries /regions, and as COO in turnaround situations.

He has lived and worked in multiple countries.


Chris Wilkie

Chris Wilkie is an ICAS member, having been admitted in 2007.

Chris is an Audit Director for Johnston Carmichael, based at the firm’s Glasgow Office.  Chris is also Head of Pensions Audit for the firm and is Audit RI for a portfolio of approximately 80 pension scheme clients across the UK.  His portfolio includes: ongoing pension schemes with an active and continuing employer; schemes with an employer which has suffered an insolvency event and the pension scheme has entered a Pension Protection Fund (PPF) assessment period; and “irregular” schemes where The Pensions Regulator has removed the incumbent trustees and appointed an independent trustee.

Chris has worked in the pensions audit team at Johnston Carmichael since 2004.  His experience includes auditing defined benefit, defined contribution and hybrid pension schemes covering schemes with up to 1 billion of assets and 10,000 members.  He regularly meets with the PPF and other professional advisors to the PPF to discuss current issues impacting the pensions industry.


David Davison

David is a Director and Owner of Spence & Partners, an actuarial and administration specialist, Dalriada Trustees, a leading firm of professional trustees and Veratta, a software and data specialist.

David specialises in advising charities and corporate bodies on pension strategy, funding negotiations and on managing pension change projects.

David is a regular contributor of articles and commentary in the press and is an acknowledged expert on multi-employer pension schemes. As well as being a member of the ICAS Pensions Committee, David is also a special adviser to the Charity Finance Group and on a Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association Working Party. David has also worked with the DWP and Scottish Government in relation to the impact of multi-employer pension schemes on third sector organisations.


John Moffat

John is self-employed, trading as JRM Training and Professional Services. Until October 2015, John worked with Grant Thornton in Scotland for 37 years. During his period with Grant Thornton, John specialised in auditing and financial reporting, in relation to large unquoted private companies, pension schemes, solicitors and similar professional service organisations

Throughout his professional career, John has had a very close involvement with ICAS. He has been a member of the ICAS Business Policy Committee and served on AAT Council as an ICAS nominated member for 5 years. John also delivers training courses for BPP, as part of its partnership with ICAS.  John is the immediate past Chair of the Pensions Panel.


Louisa Knox

Louisa is a longstanding partner within the Shepherd and Wedderburn LLP Pensions law team and has an extensive range of experience advising on pensions law issues for trustees and companies. She has significant experience in advising through the lifetime of occupational pension schemes in matters including risk reduction measures, including scheme restructuring, as well as the impact of commercial activity on schemes and negotiations with The Pensions Regulator and the Pension Protection Fund. Louisa has in-depth knowledge of EU and UK constitutional reform matters affecting schemes.

In addition, she advises regularly on the detail of European law as it affects pension provision – equalisation and equality law being particular specialisms.


Philip Briggs

Philip is a Partner at RSM and has over 25 years’ experience of delivering audit services to some of the largest UK pension schemes, Philip also has extensive experience of leading the audits of a variety of investment organisations ranging from some of the largest global asset servicing entities to smaller alternative and hedge fund managers. In addition to audit, Philip also performs risk and governance reviews for his clients.

Philip has led the audit work for a range of internal control reporting assignments (AAF01/06 and SAS70 reports) including some of the earliest applications of these frameworks to pension administrators. He leads the provision of the RSM accreditation services to PASA (the Pension Administration Standards Association). In addition to client responsibilities as Audit Principal Philip heads the National Pensions technical team within the National Pensions Group.

Philip is a member of the PRAG SORP Working Party, previously chaired the PRAG Internal Audit Working Party and is a member of the ICAEW Master Trust Assurance Framework Working Party. He is a regular speaker at other industry forums.


Rachel Northwood

Rachel is a senior manager based at PWC’s Glasgow Office.  Rachel has ten years’ experience as a specialist pensions auditor: she also has extensive experience working in the wider financial services sector in the UK and US.

Her portfolio of pensions clients includes DB and hybrid schemes, those administered by third parties as well as those managed in-house, covering all sizes up to those with net assets in excess of £15 billion.  She is also involved in managing non-audit assignments such as benefit reviews, risk register reviews and controls benchmarking exercises.  Rachel is a member of ICAEW.


Ross Graham

Ross is an Associate Partner at Aon.


ICAS comments on pensions issues

ICAS Pensions Committee responses to public consultations on pensions industry topics relevant to the accountancy profession

2022-11-mitigo 2022-11-mitigo
ICAS logo

Footer links

  • Contact us
  • Terms and conditions
  • Modern slavery statement
  • Privacy notice
  • CA magazine

Connect with ICAS

  • Facebook (opens new window) Facebook Icon
  • Twitter (opens new window) Twitter Icon
  • LinkedIn (opens new window) LinkedIn Icon
  • Instagram (opens new window) Instagram Icon

ICAS is a member of the following bodies

  • Consultative Committee of Accountancy Bodies (opens new window) Consultative Committee of Accountancy Bodies logo
  • Chartered Accountants Worldwide (opens new window) Chartered Accountants Worldwide logo
  • Global Accounting Alliance (opens new window) Global Accounting Alliance
  • International Federation of Accountants (opens new window) IFAC
  • Access Accountancy (opens new window) Access Acountancy

Charities

  • ICAS Foundation (opens new window) ICAS Foundation
  • SCABA (opens new window) scaba

Accreditations

  • ISO 9001 - RGB (opens new window)
© ICAS 2022

The mark and designation “CA” is a registered trade mark of The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland (ICAS), and is available for use in the UK and EU only to members of ICAS. If you are not a member of ICAS, you should not use the “CA” mark and designation in the UK or EU in relation to accountancy, tax or insolvency services. The mark and designation “Chartered Accountant” is a registered trade mark of ICAS, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales and Chartered Accountants Ireland. If you are not a member of one of these organisations, you should not use the “Chartered Accountant” mark and designation in the UK or EU in relation to these services. Further restrictions on the use of these marks also apply where you are a member.

ICAS logo

Our cookie policy

ICAS.com uses cookies which are essential for our website to work. We would also like to use analytical cookies to help us improve our website and your user experience. Any data collected is anonymised. Please have a look at the further information in our cookie policy and confirm if you are happy for us to use analytical cookies: