3. What account the Church Commissioners take of ethical criteria when making investments. (19323)

7. What account the Church Commissioners take of ethical criteria when making investments. (19327)

The Church Commissioners are committed to managing our assets in a way that reflects the Church’s teaching and values and take advice on ethical investment policies from the Church’s ethical investment advisory group.

How do the Church Commissioners use their substantial wealth to encourage responsible corporate practice?

My hon. Friend is right to raise this issue. The Church Commissioners seek positively to encourage responsible corporate practice by the businesses in which we invest. We are signatories to the United Nations principles for responsible investment. We vote our shares in line with the importance we attach to good corporate governance. We continuously discuss environmental, social and governance issues with our investment managers, and if ever we should have a concern about corporate practice in a company in which we invest, we engage with that company to seek to influence its corporate behaviour at board level.

What is the Church Commissioners’ attitude to arms deals, particularly the shady arms trade? What would be the commissioners’ attitude to that in terms of investment?

I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we would not invest in companies that we thought were shady. For example, we disinvested from Vedanta Resources plc recently because of its treatment of tribal communities in India. There are a number of US companies that we have made a conscious decision not to invest in because of their involvement in cluster munitions systems. Wherever possible, if we think that someone is behaving in a shady way, we would hope to influence through engagement, and engagement as a potential investor takes the Church Commissioners into discussion with the boards of some of the world’s biggest companies.

Does my hon. Friend agree that, when the Church is considering the use of its property investments, it has a charitable duty of care to the voluntary groups that may depend on the use of those properties?

Yes, of course, and I think that the Church will need to work out ways in which we can use Church property much more actively to engage with voluntary and community groups, as part of the big society initiative, which the Church has always supported and continues to support.