LAPFF and CCLA press FTSE 100 holdouts for sixth year

Net Zero Investor reports that LAPFF and CCLA are in their sixth year of pressing FTSE 100 companies to put climate transition plans to a shareholder vote. The Local Government Pension Scheme's stewardship body and fund manager CCLA are again gathering fellow investors to back resolutions that would put those plans on the ballot. Last year's supporters included Nordea, Brunel and the Church Commissioners for England, representing £3.1trn in assets under management.

The pressure is showing results. Around one in five FTSE 100 companies now offers a dedicated vote on its transition plan. Unilever, London Stock Exchange Group, Centrica and Rio Tinto are on that list, and such votes have generally drawn support from more than 90% of shareholders. Still absent, as Net Zero Investor notes, are the major financials and energy giants. BP last consulted shareholders on its climate plan in 2022 and has since announced a significant reversal of its ambitions; Barclays and Lloyds have so far offered no vote on their climate strategies.

CCLA's Tessa Younger frames the vote as a mechanism for investors to assess whether a company's pathway is credible. LAPFF chair Doug McMurdo argues the physical costs of climate change are already reaching communities and will hit the bottom lines of companies. The near-universal support is what gives the exercise force: once shareholders approve a plan, walking it back means publicly reversing a voted-on commitment rather than quietly revising in the boardroom. The oil and gas majors and big lenders sitting it out appear to grasp that.