Filming in Islington, Boris, pensions and yoof.

Up early for a spot of filming in Islington (where else) on pensions. And before you yawn, for many of us this is becoming a key issue. And it ought to be so for all my charity CEOs.

It's not just the "pensions revolution" that George Osborne announced this year, but also auto-enrolment that comes into force next year for all our staff.

  

These mean all charities have to review their existing schemes - some will not be approved for the future - and make arrangements for auto-enrolment. It has to be electronic and automatic when new staff join. There is also the question of how we tell staff about pensions and give them advice on choices.

ACEVO has worked with one of the country's top pension experts for over 14 years. Back before I came to ACEVO we chose Foster Denovo to provide our staff pensions and the experience was so good we asked them if they would work with member charities on their pension schemes. 14 years later we are now still working with them and are planning a new advisory offer, which covers both advice to us as employers and advice to staff. It's needed.

So this morning we were filming to provide a new web portal for use by employees and employers and explains key concepts and things to do and know. It stars yours truly and Ian Bird, the key guy at Foster Denovo.

Funnily enough I was having a chat on this theme with one of my newer members of staff - 23 and not enamoured with the idea of saving for a pension. I remonstrated with him! But it did show how we do need to do work with employees on why they should take an interest in pensions. As one gets nearer to that time (for me many years ahead!) pensions loom larger. But I intend to be wise and invest my pension pot rather than buying up a wine warehouse or blowing it on a round the world trip.

The film studio was in a gorgeous Georgian terrace and up the road was Boris Johnson's house. Just had to go and look!

And talking of feckless yoof, a new welfare package should be offered to young people in an attempt to slash youth unemployment, according to a report published yesterday by a leading think-tank, the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ).  It wants politicians to make a commitment that tackling youth unemployment will be a 'moral mission' in the next Parliament and calls for a fresh relationship between young people and the State. The ambitious four-stage blueprint outlines plans which will help and support young people develop work skills and training from primary school through to adulthood.

This is a good report. It shows the value of think tanks in adding to the political debate and generating good ideas, as IPPR did with their Condition of Britain report. Such a shame a number of politicians have got in such a lather over IPPR. We need organisations like them and the CSJ.

Mental Health and BoJo

Well all the press on the Ed Miliband speech yesterday has been about energy, land grabs etc. but for me the really interesting part was when he talked about mental health. This has not been widely reported but I suspect it’s the first time any party leader has used their Conference speech to highlight this issue. He used an example of a young girl who had written to say if only the signs of anxiety and depression had been recognised earlier she might have avoided the lengthy hospital stay she had endured. He said we will talk about other health issues but are reluctant to talk of mental health problems. He used this to highlight how the NHS needs to do more on prevention. This will have gone down well with my members in the health and social care sector. Indeed Ed had said that he was going to talk about mental health when he came to the ACEVO fringe meeting on Monday and Paul Farmer, CEO of MIND (and ACEVO member) was delighted. I got a chance to say thanks to Ed for that bit later that evening.

And there was another interesting speech yesterday. Boris Johnson got some good coverage in the papers for a City Hall speech in which he criticised a British "lust" for big houses and said the UK's wealthy should be philanthropic.

 Bojo declared that wealthy Britons prefer to buy “the biggest possible house they can with the most colossal grouse moor they can find” and that it was "ridiculous" more money was not given to charity. “Stop buying Home Counties Schlosses” he cried!.

Good one. He is right. The poor do give a higher proportion of their salary to charity and the rich (with some notable worthy exceptions) do less. Having advocates like the Mayor of London is greatly appreciated.