Four years on from the start of Ireland’s financial and banking crisis, the country’s €80 billion pension fund sector is still under serious pressure. But with a controversial fund levy set to continue for another year at least, and new funding regulations in the pipeline, the challenges are not going away.

The levy, introduced in 2011 in order to pay for a government programme targeted at the unemployed, is now about to enter its fourth and final year. Set at 0.6% of pension fund assets, it will have raised more than €2 billion from schemes by the time it comes to an end in 2014.