Business news live: Pensions shakeup and FTSE 100 to open near record levels

Liz Kendall, the work and pensions secretary, is to reopen the Pensions Commission as Labour seek to ensure future pensioners to do not face the gap in retirement savings they are currently set to do so.

Estimates suggest those retiring in 2050 will be almost £1,000 a year worse off than those retiring today, with not enough being saved for the future.

We’ll bring more details across the morning – but a notable change is that the automatic pensions enrolment situation for peoples’ workplace pension looks likely to change, with an outline in place to increase total contributions from 8 per cent to 12 per cent, including employer contribution.

Data has shown that business owners believe the high street in the UK is destined to become obsolete and more than a third (37 per cent) are planning to close their doors or sell up in 2025.

Simply Business’s SME report surveyed more than 2,000 business owners and a shocking 63 per cent, almost two in every three, say they believe the high street will be gone in a decade.

More to follow on this story.

Rachel Reeves’s plan to encourage savers to move their cash into investments has sparked a lively reader response, especially among older people who say they have neither the time nor appetite for risk.

Many commenters questioned the wisdom of urging people into the stock market, arguing that fixed-rate savings accounts and tax-free ISAs already offer attractive returns of 4–5 per cent, with none of the potential losses.

The results and comments show there is still lots more to be done in terms of encouraging and educating the wider population as to why investing works and who it is right for.

The UK’s benchmark index, the FTSE 100, pushed past the 9,000 points level for the first time ever last week – but despite doing so a couple of times, didn’t quite manage to stabilise above it.

This week more earnings reports will be a test of whether UK plc can breach the barrier more permanently.

There were one-off impacts last week to big businesses too, such as Diageo’s chief executive departing, GSK being hit by the FDA rejecting a new drug’s approval and WPP’s profit warning.

Good morning and welcome to the start of another week of business news coverage here on The Independent.

We’ll keep you abreast of the latest stories regarding the UK’s biggest firms, political moves impacting SMEs, personal finance, the stock markets and more.