Budget 2014 - the spark for change?

I've worked in the pensions industry for nearly 45 years and in that time, I have seen many changes to the pensions tax regimes. Most have added layers of complexity to an already overloaded pensions tax framework and many have been expected as a result of lobbying or other pressure. What was so different about the changes announced and proposed in the Budget, and the Treasury paper Freedom and choice in pensions, was that they actually reduced the complexity and took just about everyone by surprise. Yet should we have been surprised? Ever since interest rates collapsed, the annuity m...