Our mission since inception remains unchanged: “Forging better futures by investing for a world worth living in”. We have always viewed Responsible Investment not as a department or sub-section of what we do, but as integral to our fiduciary duty and to the entire investment process. Our approach and our culture have both been built on this core belief. Our sixth annual Responsible Investment & Stewardship Outcomes Report, published at the end of May, demonstrates the breadth and depth of this belief in practice. We have captured a small number of Report highlights below. We recommend viewing the full report or, at least, its two-page summary on our website.
www.brunelpensionpartnership.org
Refining our approach to maximise our impact
Our approach to RI is both dynamic and self-questioning, as we look for ways in which we can harness our impact to improve outcomes across our seven RI priorities. The “Evolving our Priorities” sub-section of our latest Outcomes Report lays out our choice of three of the seven as our “top priorities”. Click here to read.
Portfolios
Our 2024 Report showed how deeply embedded RI is in our investment process across multiple asset classes, including in UK private markets:
- 92% of assets are covered by Paris-aligned objectives & targets
- 32% of all assets are invested in the UK
- >80% of infrastructure investments are in assets that directly contribute to sustainable outcomes
- 77% of equity index-tracking funds are in Paris-aligned indices
Engagement
Our priorities translate into multiple outputs, including engagement, either directly or through our outsourced engagement provider, EOS. In 2024, EOS engaged on our behalf on 3,530 environmental, governance, strategy, risk and communication issues and objectives, moving one milestone forward for approximately 45% of its objectives over the year. Engagement numbers:
- 759 companies engaged
- 97 companies featured engagements with the CEO or chair
- 401 companies featured engagements with senior management or board members
- 121 public policy interactions including consultation responses, letters, meetings and discussions
- 1,298 meetings instructed
These interactions covered a wide range of topics, reflecting our belief in the value of engagement on all priorities – and in the inter-connectedness of our different RI priorities. Across the 3,530 issues and objectives that EOS engaged companies on:
- 40.7% were environmental issues
- 24.2% were social issues
- 27.5% were governance issues
- 7.7% were strategy, risk or communication issues
How it works
One very recent example is the 2025 shareholder resolution on Shell. Yet that resolution was just one staging post on a longer, ongoing engagement journey that started when Brunel began investing. See the 2017-2024 history of that engagement in the step-graphic on page 27 of our Outcomes Report.
Further reading
Pension Schemes Bill compliance will be a sprint, not a marathon
My Career with Faith Ward
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