Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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177. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection for an update on the roll out of the auto-enrolment pension scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [50750/25]

Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail)
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The Programme for Government contains a commitment to introduce the Automatic Enrolment (AE) Retirement Savings System. The aim of introducing AE is to address the pension coverage gap that exists in Ireland and to provide workers with greater comfort and security regarding their retirement income. The new system - to be known as My Future Fund - will commence from 1 January 2026.

Implementation of 'My Future Fund' is well underway. Most recently I announced the names of the members of the Board, including the Chair, and the Chief Executive Officer of the National Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings Authority (NAERSA), which is being established under the aegis of my Department to run the new scheme. Staff recruitment is at an advanced stage and this new body will be based in Letterkenny, Co. Donegal in the coming weeks.

Great progress has been made across several other workstreams and with multiple stakeholders, including with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), which is the managed service provider contracted to administer the system; with the the Revenue Commissioners, on whose payroll-related data NAERSA will determine eligibility; with Payroll Software Developers who are modifying their systems to calculate and deduct My Future Fund contributions and report on those to NAERSA; and with 3 different investment managers (Amundi, Blackrock and Irish Life Investment Managers) who will invest these contributions in accordance with rules set out in the legislation.

Parallel to these workstreams, a three-phased communications strategy continues to be rolled out. Over the summer we concentrated on raising employee/participant awareness with the ice-cream advertisement over the full range of media platforms. The current focus is on increasing awareness with employers. Thousands of employers and related professionals in HR and payroll have been directly reached through webinars, conferences and in person stakeholder meetings in recent months. Additional campaigns targeted at employers and employees will be run in the coming months in advance of the launch in January 2026, and for some time afterwards as well. An information hub with several useful resources exists at www.gov.ie/autoenrolment.

I hope this clarifies matters for the Deputy.