Asset owners, managers and consultants gathered at portfolio institutional‘s latest conference to debate the issues around fiduciary duty, renewable energy and active ownership. Sebastian Cheek reports.
“You have to use other tools in your armoury to go to the AGM, for example, to vote and raise issues.”
Deborah Gilshan, RPMI Railpen
INVESTMENT, ETHICS AND RISKS: HOW TO BALANCE FIDUCIARY DUTY
Asset owners have to establish their own definition of fiduciary duty rather than relying on advisers and asset managers to tell them, delegates heard.
Speaking at the portfolio institutional governance and responsible investment conference, Church Commissioners for England head of responsible investment, Edward Mason said fiduciary duty meant different things to different investors, but stressed it was critically important for asset owners to come to their own understanding of what that duty was.
He added: “I don’t think it is down to an investment consultant to tell an asset owner what their fiduciary duty is. It is really important an asset owner comes to its own sense of what that is – that should reflect the character of the organisation and the wishes of the beneficiaries.”
UKSIF chairman Lesley Alexander said advisers and asset managers had an important role to play, but added The Pensions Regulator (TPR) needed to do a lot more to support pension schemes integrating environmental, social and governance (ESG) criteria into their portfolios.