Islington Labour has continued to rapidly implement key commitments from its 2018 election manifesto with confirmation that the Council’s £1.3 billion Pension Fund will lead from the front on decarbonisation.

At a meeting of Islington Council’s Pensions Sub-Committee on 12th September, it was agreed that a new approach would be developed to further build on impressive progress the Pension Fund has made in reducing its environmental impact.

In keeping with the manifesto commitment to work towards fully divesting the Council’s Pension Fund from companies that extract fossil fuels, the announcement will see –

• investments in fossil fuels reduced further
• the fund’s carbon footprint reduced
• investments made in renewable energy and green infrastructure

Commenting on the Committee’s bold approach, Cllr David Poyser, Chair of Pensions Sub-Committee and Islington Labour councillor for Hillrise, said: 

“Thanks to Islington Labour’s leadership, the Council’s Pension Fund is at the forefront of the decarbonisation movement. We have already cut the carbon footprint of the fund’s passive shares by 45%, and a change in the fund’s in-house managed assets alone reduced carbon emissions by 14,243 tonnes a year.

 

“Decarbonisation is not only about protecting the planet, it is also about protecting the financial interests of the scheme’s 21,000 members and 6,600 pensioners, when coal, oil and gas assets end up ‘stranded’ underground.

 

“Our new approach will help build on our already impressive success in reducing the environmental impact of the Pension Funds’ investments, and we will work with other councils in London to bring pressure on companies to reduce their reliance on carbon.”

Further detail of the implementation of the new approach will be discussed by the Pensions Sub-Committee in late November.