UK finance chiefs urge pension reform to boost growth, investment [Video]

Liverpool, ENGLAND — U.K. finance chiefs are banging the drum for pension reforms to boost anaemic investment and growth in the country.

The annual Labour conference — the centre-left party’s first in power for 15 years — was awash with delegates from the City of London urging the government to move decisively with plans to make retirement schemes more competitive.

William Vereker, chairman of Santander U.K., cited pension reform as one of three paths to economic growth, alongside skills and education, and regulation.

“We are almost wholly reliant for investment in this country at the moment, on the kindness of strangers. We’re reliant on external companies, external investors and so on, to invest in our stock markets, invest in our businesses, and that just isn’t sustainable,” Vereker told a room …