Meeting documents

The Chair will allow members of the public to present a petition on any matter within the Board’s remit. Questions or statements about any matter on the agenda for this meeting will be taken at the time when each matter is considered.

A question was submitted by Mr Sigurd Reimers who was in attendance at the meeting:

Question: The Government is currently consulting on plans for a new Sustainability Disclosure Requirements (SDR) regime, in its document Local Government Pension Scheme (England and Wales): Governance and reporting of climate change risk.

Is our Pensions Board involved in this process, and will it be disclosing what opinions it holds on this broader issue, referred to in the introduction to the Government document?

"SDR will be broader than financial risk, extending to environmental impact (including disclosures based on definitions contained in the UK Green Taxonomy), and over time, to factors beyond climate, including broader sustainability factors such as environmental and social considerations".

The Chair invited the Funds and Investments Manager – Mr Anton Sweet to read his prepared response ahead of discussion. The Officer stated that his response would also be covered under item 6 – ‘Review of Pensions Committee Papers’ on this meeting’s agenda where discussion may be more appropriate. It was also agreed that Mr Reimers would receive the response by email.

Response:The Fund is supportive of the Government’s proposals to improve the level of disclosure of non-financial information regarding the LGPS’s investments.  The Fund has already publicly stated it will meet the eventual regulations in full as a minimum standard. 

The Chair thanked Mr Sweet for his response and asked whether Brunel feed back into the consultation process on behalf of the Board. The Officer replied this does not happen on behalf of the Board. As a government consultation, this is open to anyone and if the Somerset County Council (SCC) Pension Fund wished to make a response, then that could be arranged. Brunel could make a response to the consultation in their own right, but not on behalf of the underlying funds. Committee members could also respond individually. Any response on behalf of SCC would require prior approval and would be circulated to board and committee members for sign-off. If the timescale did not allow formal sign off from both bodies, then approval would be sought from Chair of the Pensions Committee as the decision-making body.

Mr Nigel Behan – UNITE, asked if individual submissions from committee members in a personal capacity would be appropriate. Mr Sweet replied that this would be technically possible but he would be disappointed if this was felt necessary as it would indicate a lack of agreement amongst the Board and Committee members.