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06/02/2006
TUC launches fund manager survey
The Trades Union Congress has launched its 2006 Fund Manager Voting Survey.
The survey asks how investors voted on key issues at company AGMs last year.
The survey provides pension fund trustees with information about how managers are addressing governance issues at the companies they invest in.
The TUC said that the survey provides the only resource for trustees that details comparative records of investor engagement, because fund managers do not have to disclose publicly how they exercise their voting rights on behalf of pension funds.
This year's survey, the fourth to be conducted, has been expanded to collect details of other forms of investor engagement with companies besides voting and the number of AGM items where voting records are sought has been reduced from 50 to 17 to prevent the results becoming too unwieldy. The survey also had a greater focus on corporate social responsibility issues.
The TUC said that it would send the survey to its 1,000-strong network of pension fund member trustees, who are responsible for funds worth over £260 billion, to encourage them to find out how their fund managers voted on key issues.
The union said that past surveys had provided "strong evidence" to support the government's efforts to require investors to disclose voting records through the Company Law Reform Bill, currently going through Parliament.
Despite a 65% increase in responses to the 2005 survey, nine out of ten fund managers who don't currently publish their voting records said they had no plans to do so in the future.
TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: "Our survey has begun to lift the veil of secrecy covering how fund managers govern billions of pounds of investments on behalf of pensions savers. But only just over half of fund managers respond to the survey voluntarily, an improvement but not enough, and almost all the rest say they have no intention of publishing their voting decisions.
"A number of major investors are already disclosing but others have made it clear that they will only do so if there is a level playing field on which everybody has to be transparent. The government should stick to its ambition of ending secrecy in the city by requiring all fund managers to disclose how they vote at company AGMS."
Results of the survey will be published at a major TUC pension fund trustee conference, which takes place on June 9.
(KMcA)
The survey asks how investors voted on key issues at company AGMs last year.
The survey provides pension fund trustees with information about how managers are addressing governance issues at the companies they invest in.
The TUC said that the survey provides the only resource for trustees that details comparative records of investor engagement, because fund managers do not have to disclose publicly how they exercise their voting rights on behalf of pension funds.
This year's survey, the fourth to be conducted, has been expanded to collect details of other forms of investor engagement with companies besides voting and the number of AGM items where voting records are sought has been reduced from 50 to 17 to prevent the results becoming too unwieldy. The survey also had a greater focus on corporate social responsibility issues.
The TUC said that it would send the survey to its 1,000-strong network of pension fund member trustees, who are responsible for funds worth over £260 billion, to encourage them to find out how their fund managers voted on key issues.
The union said that past surveys had provided "strong evidence" to support the government's efforts to require investors to disclose voting records through the Company Law Reform Bill, currently going through Parliament.
Despite a 65% increase in responses to the 2005 survey, nine out of ten fund managers who don't currently publish their voting records said they had no plans to do so in the future.
TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: "Our survey has begun to lift the veil of secrecy covering how fund managers govern billions of pounds of investments on behalf of pensions savers. But only just over half of fund managers respond to the survey voluntarily, an improvement but not enough, and almost all the rest say they have no intention of publishing their voting decisions.
"A number of major investors are already disclosing but others have made it clear that they will only do so if there is a level playing field on which everybody has to be transparent. The government should stick to its ambition of ending secrecy in the city by requiring all fund managers to disclose how they vote at company AGMS."
Results of the survey will be published at a major TUC pension fund trustee conference, which takes place on June 9.
(KMcA)
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