Ros Altmann, Baroness Altmann

Rosalind Miriam Altmann, Baroness Altmann CBE, is a British life peer, economist, and independent expert on pensions, retirement policy, and later-life financial security. She holds a first-class honours degree in economics from University College London, a Kennedy Scholarship at Harvard University, and a PhD from the London School of Economics examining pension income and poverty in old age.

Altmann built her career managing institutional pension fund portfolios at firms including Chase Manhattan and Rothschild Asset Management before establishing a consultancy focused on pensions and long-term investment advice to governments, regulators, and corporations. She served as Director-General of the Saga Group from 2010 to 2013 and chaired the Lord Chancellor’s Strategic Investment Board, while also acting as a non-executive adviser on public sector investments. Her advocacy gained national attention through the unpaid 'Pensiontheft' campaign, which pressured the government to establish the Financial Assistance Scheme and Pension Protection Fund, ultimately compensating over 150,000 workers whose defined-benefit pensions were lost due to employer insolvency.

Rosalind Miriam Altmann was born on 8 April 1956 in the United Kingdom. Her parents were Jewish refugees who fled Nazi persecution: her mother, Renata, was born in Berlin, Germany, and her father in Vienna, Austria, before escaping to the UK in the late 1930s. Renata Altmann, an artist who had worked as a model and designer earlier in life, later resided in Herzliya Pituach, Israel.

Altmann was raised in Tottenham, North London, within a Jewish family affiliated with the United Synagogue, an Orthodox denomination emphasizing traditional observance including Shabbat and festivals. This environment fostered a strong sense of Jewish identity, with family practices centered on religious and communal life in a vibrant North London Jewish community descended from European refugees.

She attended the Henrietta Barnett School, a selective state girls' grammar school in Hampstead Garden Suburb, known for its academic rigor and location in a historically Jewish-influenced area of London. This schooling provided a foundation in a competitive educational setting, aligning with the family's emphasis on achievement amid post-war immigrant aspirations.