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@7.12 22.19 Oh dear, here we go again with the ill informed comments about nobody losing money in cash terms.

It’s a negative rate in that it is less than the headline rate of inflation, after tax, and without the assistance of a professional advisor. It is calculated according to gilt returns, which most insurance providers themselves use for long term investments.

To give you some idea - if the DR moved to zero you would be looking for a gross rate of return at the moment of around 4%, and the investment would not have a risk of losing money.

To get near that you would have to pay for a financial advisor and as the insurer won’t pay the costs of that you would need about 6.5% to break even, with a zero DR.

The NHS are at present underwriting cases using a -2% effective discount rate for their PPOs so there is a decent argument to say that the current rate is too high.