The long-awaited auto-enrolment pension system is to be introduced on a phased basis from 2022, according to a recent announcement from the Department of Employment Social Affairs.

Under the new arrangement, all workers will be automatically enrolled in an occupational pension scheme – with contributions from their employer and the State, as well as the employee – when they start a job.

The scheme will apply to all employees aged between 23 and 60 earning more than €20,000 a year who are not already in a workplace pension scheme.

Under the scheme, workers will start paying contributions equal to 1.5% of salary, rising to 6% of salary in their tenth year of employment. Employers will be compelled to make matching contributions.

The level of Government contribution has yet to be finalised.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions’ (ICTU) social policy officer Laura Bambrick, who has given a broad welcome to the scheme, told RTÉ’s Today at Sean O’Rourke programme that the scheme had been discussed for nearly two decades. “Less than half of all workers have a pension, and in the private sector less than one in three workers have a pension”, she said.

Listen to Laura on RTÉ HERE.

Read the Congress guide to auto-enrolment HERE.