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Sarah Swift

Partner

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Languages: Italian (good), French (basic)

Sarah is a Partner experienced in pensions law. She specializes in advising both trustees and employers of large, complex DB and DC schemes.

Sarah qualified into pensions law in 1999 and worked at a Magic Circle firm until joining Eversheds Sutherland as a Partner in 2012. Sarah advises on all aspects of pensions law and is a well-established figure in the pensions industry. Sarah splits her work pretty equally between trustee and employer clients. The common theme is that the pension schemes involved tend to be large (multibillion-pound) and complex occupational schemes in the private sector, many of which were set up decades ago.

Sarah’s work has included advising on closures to accrual, corporate reorganizations and interaction with The Pensions Regulator, pension scheme mergers, liability management exercises and transfers to master-trusts. Most recently, Sarah has worked with a client to put in place a funding, security and investment framework agreement for a £1bn-plus pension scheme, advised on a complicated 4-way pension scheme merger, closure exercise and buy-in all of which completed within a 3-month window and is advising on several ongoing GMP equalization and conversion exercises. Sarah is also developing a keen interest in collective defined contribution schemes as the potential new “third way” for pension saving in the UK from later in 2022.

Sarah is used to working closely with lawyers in other disciplines including investment, banking, data protection and cyber risk in order to give clients joined-up advice where input from these areas is needed.

Within Eversheds Sutherland, Sarah heads up the national pensions team's Quality & Risk function ensuring that good governance and technical excellence is embedded in the culture.

Sarah is a collaborative lawyer who likes working with clients and their other advisers as well as those in her team to achieve practical, effective solutions to issues. In the 2021 edition of Chambers & Partners she was praised by clients as being “excellent and well-informed.”

She is also a passionate advocate for working mothers and dog-owners, and in her spare time when not dog-walking she loves the cinema.

Sarah's recent experience includes:

  • ongoing general advice to trustees of large DB and DC pension schemes
  • advising on GMP equalization and conversion exercises including in relation to complicated aspects such as DC GMP underpin members
  • putting in place a bespoke, complex funding and security package between employer and trustees of a large multibillion-pound DB scheme
  • advising on issues arising in the industry-wide £43bn Electricity Supply Pension Scheme
  • advising trustees on putting in place a dividend-sharing mechanism
  • giving trustee training on the Pension Schemes Act 2021
  • drafting and checking regulatory compliance of Chair’s statements for large occupational DC schemes
  • advising trustee boards on interactions with The Pensions Regulator
  • advising employer-side on a 4-way pension merger, use of surplus, closure and buy-in exercise
  • giving trustee training on buy-ins and buy-outs, in conjunction with the pension insurance team
  • advising trustees on the implications of a corporate reorganization and substitution of principal employer
  • Ranked in both Chambers and The Legal 500
  • Ranked in Chambers UK 2018, 2019
  • Elected in December 2021 to a two-year position on the Main Committee of the Association of Pension Lawyers. In this role she helps steer the APL’s role in the industry. She has previously served several years on the APL’s Legislative and Parliamentary Committee
  • Regularly participates in the industry through attending the CBI’s pension panel meetings
  • In 2021, chaired and spoke at several Eversheds Sutherland events
  • Most recently, reprised her role co-chairing the Eversheds Sutherland annual pension conference together with Francois Barker. The most recent event comprised a distinguished panel of speakers including the Minister for Pensions as well as Sarah Smart from The Pensions Regulator
  • Regularly participates in a virtual series on the innovative set of PMI tutorial days for professional trustees that she has run with Francois Barker for the past 5 years. These sessions receive continually excellent feedback and are now opened up to the market to all trustees wishing to sit the exam
  • Took part by invitation in the Law Debenture Debate in the formal debating chamber at One Great George Street
  • BA Honours, Classics, Durham University, 1992-1995
Sarah Swift

Partner

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