Pension Funds

Most universities have a pension scheme for their nonacademic staff while academic staff are in the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) or the Teachers’ Pension Scheme (the Teachers’ Pension Scheme is not invested in shares).

The USS has a SRI policy that is based on ‘engagement’ alone. They need to be challenged as to how they propose to evaluate the process of ‘engagement’ and what they will do if they recognise that it has failed. (See Appendix 2 for more information on engagement.)

Charitable funds

Knowledge of charitable funds held by universities and colleges is sketchy relative to other sectors. If your university informs you that it has no investments in the target companies, it would be useful to know if this is based on ethical or financial considerations, or because they have no investments at all.