The National Association of Pension Funds' (NAPF) chairman Mark Hyde Harrison comments on the challenges that the pensions world will face in the year ahead, and says that "more needs to be done".

The pensions world will continue to see major change in the year ahead, but if those changes are to be lasting and positive, then the industry needs to do more to address trust.

Too many people do not trust pensions and, more specifically, the pensions industry. This suspicion has not been helped by the Government tinkering with the rules over the years.

However, trust can be rebuilt. Auto-enrolment may have been launched last year but it is going to have a huge and growing impact through 2013 as many employers, many of them large household names, continue to come on board. The public has to have faith in the system.

So it is encouraging that 2013 will see some welcome and high-level scrutiny of defined contribution (DC) pensions and whether they offer good value for money. The Government, The Pensions Regulator (TPR), the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and the Financial Services Authority (FSA) all have initiatives in this area.

The NAPF was at the forefront of driving this change with its launch of a code of conduct on DC pension charges, developed with the help of a wide-ranging industry group. This code introduces much improved disclosure of charges to employers selecting auto-enrolment schemes to enable them to understand all the charges and impacts that this will have on the pension pots of their employees. This is an important step in improving transparency and helping to rebuild trust.

Trust aside, another area where pension funds could do better is in acknowledging their responsibilities as stewards of the assets they own. I believe that trustees have a fiduciary duty to try to exercise all the rights of the assets they own on behalf of the members. The exercising of this duty can be delegated to asset managers and then trustees only need to ensure that those entrusted discharge that responsibility. Many funds will say that they recognise this responsibility to vote when asked, but they have failed to recognise that they need to do more to ensure that the public and politicians will trust them. They need to publically acknowledge this stewardship responsibility by signing up to the Stewardship Code. More needs to be done in 2013.

An issue that is set to be hotly debated this year is quantitative easing (QE) and how the authorities can help defined benefit (DB) 'final salary' pension funds weather its effect on valuations and deficits. The Government is now looking into this and we hope that action will be forthcoming. The cost to DB pensions of QE had been around £90bn of additional liabilities, and we are starting to see what effect that is having. The NAPF 2012 Annual Survey found that private sector DB schemes closed their doors to new staff at the fastest rate on record. Just 13% of final salary pensions were open to new joiners in 2012, a drop of a third from 19% in 2011. And one thing is certain – there will be more change in the year ahead.

One issue right at the forefront of the UK's pensions lobbying agenda in the year ahead is the threat posed by the EU and its proposals for new solvency rules for occupational pension schemes. If these rules were to come into effect, then the retirement prospects for millions of workers – not just here, but elsewhere in Europe too – would be significantly damaged, as would UK competitiveness and growth prospects. We have a strong coalition in the UK and with our friends and colleagues elsewhere in Europe, and at PensionsEurope. We must remain united in our opposition to these damaging rules if we are to have any chance of delivering decent, sustainable and adequate pensions for the citizens of Europe.

So there's a lot to do in 2013. But it's encouraging that so many things are heading in the right direction – particularly auto-enrolment and the promise of radical and long overdue reform of the state pension. With household budgets remaining under pressure, and the outlook for the economy weak at best, it's vital that the industry does all it can to help people get on board with pensions, and to get good value for money. Saving for retirement needs to become the norm, not a luxury.

Written by Mark Hyde Harrison, chairman, NAPF