Issue - meetings

To consider the Ethical Investment Policy report.

Councillor de Vries presented the report regarding the Ethical Investment Policy. He said the topic of ethical investment had been a point of conversation at every Investment Board meeting, and he was pleased that a strong investment portfolio was being paired with an equally strong ethical investment policy. He proposed adoption of the Ethical Investment Policy.

Councillor LeCount seconded the proposal.

RESOLVED that the Council formally adopts the revised Ethical Investment Policy (Appendix 1).

To consider the Ethical Investment Policy report.

RESOLVED to recommend to Council that it formally adopts the revised Ethical Investment Policy as set out at Appendix One.

Councillor Reeve presented the report relating to the Ethical Investment Policy, which had been recommended to Cabinet by the Investment Board. He thanked Councillor Khan and the Director – Corporate and Financial Services for their work on the Policy. He said the core elements had been taken from the United Nations model policy and, whilst it was simple, it was effective. He said the model policy that had been debated by the Investment Board had included “excluded industries,” such as tobacco, but these had been removed as the majority of members on the Investment Board felt it was better to use the principles outlined in the Policy in their own right, rather than rely on an exclusion list. He proposed approval of the recommendation.

Councillor Pepper duly seconded.

Councillor Caton said he was disappointed that the exclusions had not been included in the recommended policy, and felt that things such as gambling should also have been excluded from any council investment strategy.

Councillor Gregory commended the Policy.

RESOLVED to recommend to Council that it formally adopts the revised Ethical Investment Policy as set out at Appendix One.

To consider the Ethical Investment Policy Report.

The Chair introduced the report and thanked Councillor Khan for his help in producing the policy.

In response to Members questions the Chair made the following points: -

• The policy was forward looking and therefore would not be used retrospectively for current tenants.
• The policy covered the United Nations principle of defence responsibility through the monitoring of the way the military was used to ensure they were not complicit in human rights abuses.
• The list of exclusions was discussed and whether it should be kept in the document or removed.
• The document would need to be reviewed regularly.

Councillor Sell suggested a concise summary at the beginning to set out what the Council’s ethical code of practice was by using a statement he had found from Keele University.

The Director – Finance and Corporate Services said that the document should not be held up by any amendments made to the summary at this stage.  He suggested that the wording could be looked at in a first review and the Keele University statement could be incorporated at that point.

The Chair agreed but asked for the list of exclusions to be removed from the document. 

The Investment Board showed its overall support for removing the exclusions by a show of hands, 5 in favour of removal and 3 against. 

AGREED that the report would be recommended to Cabinet with the list of exclusions removed but with a covering note to explain what they were and why they had been removed.   

Councillor Bagnall left the meeting at 6:10pm