Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures

Brunel Pension Partnership engaged with 881 companies on 3,101 ESG issues over the course of 2020, helping to achieve progress towards targets on carbon saving, water intensity reduction, and gender equality.

Focus has shifted to the ‘social’ part of ESG, says Hope William-Smith, but this has its own challenges for trustees.

A Treasury Select Committee report on net-zero transitions and the future of green finance has called on the government to consider climate labelling for financial products and ramp up efforts to tackle greenwashing.

Professional Pensions rounds up some of the latest ESG and climate news from across the industry.

Corporate reporting needs to improve to meet investor expectations on the issue of climate change, the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) says.

The industry has broadly backed proposals to require the largest schemes to publish climate risk disclosures but raised concerns about the workload of implementation as well as how to standardise the methodology used.

The government has put forward proposals to require the 100 largest occupational pension schemes – those with £5bn or more in assets and all authorised master trusts – to publish climate risk disclosures by the end of 2022.

A consultation has been launched on guidance to help schemes get to grips with assessing, managing, and reporting climate-related risks in-line with Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD).

The Pensions Climate Risk Industry Group is drafting trustee guidance on climate-related issues and how they can address the risks as part of their governance processes.