Clair Alcock

Interviewee:

Clair Alcock
Board Secretary
LGPS Scheme Advisory Board

LAPF Investments speaks with Clair Alcock to discuss some of the issues shaping the sector

Clair is a passionate advocate for public service pensions, with a career spanning over two decades dedicated to making complex systems more transparent, fair, and accessible. With a deep-rooted commitment to pension scheme managers and members, Clair has become a trusted voice in the UK’s public sector pensions landscape.

Where do you see the biggest common ground between LGPS governance and other highly regulated financial services operating models (intermediary platforms and asset managers) and what can LGPS borrow to improve decision quality and pace?

The LGPS operates within a statutory and democratic framework that has long supported transparency, accountability and clear governance. This strong foundation enables effective decision‑making across the scheme. With Fit for the Future introducing mandatory FCA regulation for pools, the sector will benefit from more consistent and rigorous regulatory standards, improving clarity and strengthening oversight. Although other regulated sectors may offer insights, the LGPS can continue enhancing decision quality and pace by building on existing structures and its collaborative culture.

While operational challenges are expected as funds and pools adjust to new governance expectations and develop consistency in working together, the governance changes introduced through Fit for the Future support this transition by establishing stronger frameworks. Committees will retain responsibility for strategic decisions such as setting the Investment Strategy and new LGPS Senior Officer and Independent Person roles will enhance assurance, challenge, and accountability. Local pension boards will continue to assist in compliance of the regulations.

The Scheme Advisory Board through its Compliance and Reporting Committee will work to align these statutory roles and clarify how funds interact with regulators such as TPR and FCA, while developing workplans to support implementation across governance, fund‑pool relationships and future reporting. Greater scrutiny, through the IGR process and the Board’s peer support programme, will help identify issues earlier and drive more informed decision making.

By clarifying roles, strengthening assurance and aligning expectations, the reforms create more predictable, timely governance pathways. This directly supports faster, higher‑quality decisions, positioning the LGPS for long‑term resilience and success.

From 1 April 2026, administering authorities are expected to take principal investment advice from their pool. What does a ‘minimum viable’ advice operating model look like in practice, people, process, data, and accountability?

A minimum viable model for principal investment advice must ensure a clear separation between the advisory function and the pool’s implementation activities. This separation is essential for managing conflicts of interest and enabling administering authorities to meet their fiduciary responsibilities. Previous legal advice on conflicts of interest obtained by the Scheme Advisory Board should inform processes that distinguish advice from implementation.

Principal advice must be explicitly anchored to each fund’s high‑level financial objectives, including required returns, risk appetite, cash‑flow needs and local investment. Pools must demonstrate how their recommendations support these objectives and reflect fund‑specific priorities and preferences, particularly in Responsible Investment, ensuring proposals align with each fund’s ESG values. Where a pool’s internal offering does not meet these objectives as effectively as an external manager or a solution offered by another pool, the advisory model must allow for and fairly evaluate alternatives.

To remain credible, advice must be transparent, evidence‑based and capable of withstanding scrutiny. This requires standardised formats, clear documentation of assumptions and risks, and auditable records of challenge. The advisory function should operate independently from product development and portfolio management, ensuring commercial considerations or implementation routes do not influence advice.

To ensure accountability, partner funds need a defined oversight process to review advice against their investment strategy. A minimum viable model is therefore one in which advice is technically robust, aligned with strategic aims, transparently reasoned and clearly separate from implementation, giving committees the assurance needed to act in the best interests of members and employers.

With tighter reporting rules being introduced for pools, particularly around performance and costs, pools are likely to become more time poor than ever. What needs to be implemented to help support and accelerate their reporting processes?

Supporting pools to meet tighter performance and cost reporting requirements will require clear national frameworks, more consistent data and stronger collaboration across the LGPS. Recent strengthening of annual report guidance has already helped by standardising how funds and pools present performance, cost and stewardship information. The Scheme Advisory Board is already working closely with its committees to develop improved reporting frameworks, update guidance, explore common templates and identify where alignment can reduce duplication.

The Board’s LGPS Code of Transparency updated in 2025, and the jointly developed Cost Transparency Initiative (CTI) templates ensure funds receive consistent cost data. The Board is also establishing a new Cost Transparency and Benchmarking framework through the National LGPS Frameworks, allowing funds to procure validated, collated data with benchmarking and analysis to support better decision making.

As pools prepare for new regulatory expectations, many have expanded and professionalised their teams. While positive, this has drawn experienced staff from funds, as pools can offer higher salaries than local government pay structures. This disparity has created challenges for retaining expertise and raised concerns among elected members about transparency, accountability and the long-term fund-level capability.

Collaboration between funds and pools will therefore be essential. The Board intends to play a facilitative role, strengthening relationships, supporting shared working groups and helping surface common challenges, including work to align reporting methods for Local Investment.

Taken together, enhanced frameworks and stronger collaborative structures will help pools accelerate reporting processes while reducing administrative burden.