Member

Crucially, trustees remain at the heart of decision-making and must consider the legislative safeguards, as set out in Clause 10, before they agree to release surplus. I will turn to those next but, to summarise, as part of these considerations, trustees must receive actuarial certification that the scheme meets a prudent funding threshold and members must be notified before surplus is released. Our changes preserve trustee discretion over surplus release. By giving additional flexibility to trustees to pay surplus to employers, we anticipate that they will be in a strong position to negotiate additional benefits from surplus for members as a condition of any payment.