SWITZERLAND - The Swiss government has set up the new top pensions supervisory body - dubbed the Oberaufsichtskommission - and named Pierre Triponez its first president.

Triponez is currently an MP for the liberal party and member of the commission for health and social security.

He will leave the national assembly at the end of the parliamentary term this summer before taking office as president of the Oberaufsichtskommission on 1 August.

The other members of the supervisory body will be elected in the autumn, but Triponez was named ahead to help the social ministry (BSV) set up the organisation, which is to start operations in January 2012.

The new supervisory body, which has been criticised by senior figures in the Swiss pensions industry, will only have 25.5 employees.

In a release, the government said: "This means the costs can be reduced from CHF1 to CHF0.8 per pension fund member and year compared with the originally presented bill."

At the same time, the government also issued several other decrees regarding the structural reform of the second pillar.

As widely expected, front running, parallel running and after running, or tailgating, will now be forbidden, and there will be stricter regulations on governance and controlling in pension funds.

However, there were several other changes to the initial draft that had received a lot of criticism during the consultation phase.

For example, pension funds will be given until the end of 2012, if necessary, to implement the new decrees and regulations instead of having to apply them by December 2011.

The government also decided not to make one internal control structure compulsory for all pension funds regardless of their size and complexity.

A point that had been criticised especially by the pension fund association ASIP was the requirement for pension funds' managing directors and chief investment officers to declare their personal income to the pension fund's auditor.

This was altered to their having to disclose these details to the top body at the pension fund rather than the auditor.

ASIP said it welcomed the changes to the initial draft, but added that still some regulations remained that "lacked legal basis", such as the increase of pension benefits when buffers are not fully replenished.

"Further," ASIP added, "it remains to be seen whether the planned control mechanisms are actually more than sedatives."

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