Pillars of Responsible Investing

In your opinion, what are the core pillars of responsible stewardship of capital?

There are two key pillars for any investment activity and those are the way in which we, first of all, traditionally think about investment, which is the allocation of capital. These days, when we talk about that activity, we automatically assume that we are taking account of environmental, social and governance factors. The second pillar of responsible capital investment is around stewardship of that capital. What that means is, when we buy into a company, either through its equity or through a debt or a loan or, indeed, buy into a real asset like a building, when we eventually come to sell that asset, many years later, we would like to be assured that we will be leaving it in a better place than when we first bought the asset. That means, we are going to be very active in voting, where we have the ability to vote. We’re going to attempt to improve the asset, in conjunction with the management of the company, through a process of engagement and nudging them, to take account of, what are the real material issues that affect all stakeholders in that company.