The world is facing a climate catastrophe and businesses around the world must address it urgently – or face the ultimate sanction for a public company – shareholders who refuse to back them anymore. That is not a message from an environmental action group but from the largest money manager in the UK, Legal & General Investment Management, which manages £1 trillion worth of UK pension fund investments. Its climate warning was the top of a list of concerns about the way companies are run. Other red lights included the level of executive pay, lack of diversity in senior corporate roles, the role (and cost) of political lobbying and the poor quality of the financial information provided by auditors. Legal & General insist that it is not just virtue signalling. The company voted against the re-election of nearly 4,000 directors in 2018 – an increase of 37%. That included votes against over 100 board chairs on the basis of gender diversity alone. Legal & General’s director of corporate governance, Sacha Sadan, said it was getting tougher with company boards and managements.
BBC 16th April 2019 read more »
Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos has launched a stinging attack over the way fracking is being regulated, claiming the industry “is being stopped from moving forward”. The petrochemicals and energy giant, owned by Britain’s wealthiest man and one of two companies with the right to undertake fracking in England, has threatened to walk away from operations unless regulations are loosened. Fracking must be halted if tremors of 0.5 or more on the Richter scale are triggered – a limit Sir Jim’s company wants revising to a more “sensible” level. Minutes of a meeting in November with the watchdog, the Oil and Gas Authority, revealed Ineos was “keen to have a dialogue” with the Government on the 0.5 tremor regulations. Ineos believed the limit was “artificially low”, according to a freedom of information request made by the Financial Times.
Telegraph 15th April 2019 read more »
Ineos, the energy and petrochemicals company controlled by Britain’s richest man, has warned it could abandon its plans to frack in England unless rules governing the fledgling shale gas industry are relaxed.
FT 15th April 2019 read more »
