1983
and 1984

Setup
of Ethical Investment Research Service (EIRIS,
2003b)

Launch
of the Friends Provident Stewardship Fund (Shepherd,
2001)

1991

Formation
of UKSIF, which brought together key figures
across the full range of ethical and socially
responsible investment to cooperate in sharing
knowledge and advancing the SRI agenda (Shepherd,
2001)

1993

The
Goode Committee on Pension Law Reform highlighted
the legality of ethical investment for pension
funds and declared that trustees are “perfectly
entitled to have a policy on ethical investment
and to pursue that policy, so long as they treat
the interests of the beneficiaries as paramount
and the investment policy is consistent with
the standards of care and prudence required
by law” (Mansley, 2000: 14)

1998

All-Party
Parliamentary Group on SRI set up with secretariat
provided by UKSIF. Tony Coleman chairs the group
(UKSIF website)

A
group of university lecturers launches the “Ethics
for USS” campaign to promote SRI as a
viable investment strategy for their pension
fund (USS) (Eurosif, 2003)

17%
of shareholders vote in favour of a resolution
at Shell’s AGM regarding its social and
environment policy—engagement becomes
a key trend within U.K. SRI (Eurosif, 2003)

1998

John
Denham, the then Pensions Minister, announces
proposals for amending the 1995 Pension Act,
the SRI Pensions Disclosure Regulation, at UKSIF’s
annual lecture in July (Eurosif, 2003)

UKSIF
responds to the Treasury’s “Financial
Services and Market Bill Consultation”
document and argues that “trustees should
incorporate certain environmental consideration
as part of their financial considerations.”
Advocates that regulated persons be required
to “ask consumers whether they have any
ethical, social or environmental concerns which
they wish to have taken into account in financial
advice which they receive” (Waygood, 2004)

1999

Stephen
Timms introduces the requirement to Parliament

War
on Want (U.K. anti-poverty NGO) launches “Invest
in Freedom Campaign” aimed at union members,
requesting support for the promotion of engagement
with their occupational pension fund. The report
“does not advocate disinvestments in those
companies that have violated workers rights.
Rather, we encourage and organise pension fund
holders and their trustees to use their combined
financial might to pressure companies to (establish
and implement) a code of conduct enshrining
ILO Core Labour Standards” (Waygood, 2004)

2000

The
enactment of the SRI Pension Disclosure Regulation,
under the 1995 Pensions Act, comes into effect
on July 3, requiring occupational pension funds
to disclose the extent (if at all) to which
they take SEE issues into account (Eurosif,
2003)

A
consortium “Just Pensions” is established
in February by development charities War on
Want and Traidcraft. The aim was to produce
guidance material for pension fund trustees,
pension fund managers and pension fund advisers
on development-related issues and their links
with investment and to communicate this guidance
to the investment community. The consortium
has been taken over by UKSIF (Waygood, 2004)

USS
published its first SRI report (Eurosif, 2003)

2000

UKSIF
survey in October finds that 59% of the largest
pension funds, representing over £230
billion in assets, have incorporated SEE issues
in their SIPs (Mathieu, 2000)

Various
fund managers—ISIS (previously Friends
Ivory & Sime), AMP/NPI/Henderson, Aviva/Morley,
the Co-operative Insurance Society (CIS), Insight
Investment, Jupiter and Standard Life—adopted
SRI engagement overlays (Eurosif, 2003)

Dutch
union FNV calls for pension funds to draw up
investment codes (Eurosif, 2003)

2001

The
Myners Review of Institutional Investment in
the U.K. advocated shareholder activism across
a broad range of issues (Blake, 2003)

Launch
of social index—FTSE4GOOD family of social
indices—to enable investors to compare
social and environmental performance of companies
(Eurosif, 2003)

The
Association of British Insurers publishes new
guidelines asking companies to report on material
SEE issues relevant to their business activities
(Eurosif, 2003)

Similar
regulations follow in Belgium and France. European
Union steps into CSR strategy (Eurosif, 2003)

2002

Over
250 MPs sign an early-day motion urging the
government to enshrine policies in company law
to ensure that companies disclose information
on the SEE impacts of their business (Eurosif,
2003)

The
Cabinet office publishes its Review of Charities
Law ‘Private Action, Public Benefit’;
which proposes similar regulation for U.K. charities
with income of more than £1 million. (UKSIF
website)

Institutional
Shareholders Committee (ISC) issues new statements
of principles for investors, which include monitoring
the performance of and establishing a regular
dialogue with investee companies; evaluating
the impact of investor activism; and reporting
back to clients/beneficial owners (ISC, 2002)

Germany
adopts regulation for private pension funds
(Eurosif, 2003)

2003

The
Home Office accepts the recommendations made
in Review of Charity Law, stating that the government’s
review of the effectiveness of legislation requiring
pension funds to disclose their SRI policies
will inform the framing of the equivalent provision
for charities (UKSIF website)

The
Department of Trade and Industry’s Operating
and Financial Review Working Group on Materiality
publishes its consultation document, which recommends
that company directors use an auditable process
to determine which social and environmental
issues are material to the business and should
be reported (DTI, 2003)