Liontrust Sustainable Investment Engagement and Voting Annual Review 2021 - Flipbook - Page 20
2021 Initiative
Description
We said we would:
In 2021:
Ensuring worker
well-being
How companies
manage and look after
their workforce through
direct operations and
workers further down
their supply chains can
directly affect corporate
reputation and overall
business performance.
We will engage to
encourage companies
to offer decent work and
pay living wages and
to ensure they mitigate
risks, protect workers’
rights and maximise the
opportunities to support
employees. We will also
encourage companies
to use their influence
to drive forward best
practice further down
their supply chains.
Engagement will cover
companies’ response
to and management of
the pandemic, including
workforce adaptation,
Covid-19 safety,
redundancies and supply
chain impacts.
• Encourage investee
companies to
respond to the 2021
Workforce Disclosure
Initiative (WDI) Survey.
• Request investee
• We wrote to 78
companies complete
companies to
the WDI 2022 Survey.
encourage them to
Increase the proportion
participate in the WDI.
of investee companies
• We thanked 11
participating in the
companies that
2022 survey (in
had already stated
2021, it was 20%).
they would be
• For companies that
participating.
responded in 2021,
• Several of our
encourage further
holdings won WDI
disclosure in areas
Transparency awards,
where it was lacking.
including Puma,
• Use 2021 WDI
Standard Chartered
data to engage with
and St. James’s Place.
investee companies
• We engaged with
where there are
six companies on
specific opportunities,
Covid-19, focusing on
such as where
those that were most
are there gaps in
severely impacted or
reporting relative to
exposed.
peers, performance
weaknesses or areas
of concern.
• Pay particular attention
to how companies
deal with worker
health and safety as
we move through the
Covid-19 pandemic.
In 2022, we will:
Workforce Disclosure Initiative (WDI) Survey
The Workforce Disclosure Initiative was set up by ShareAction,
funded by the UK’s Department for International Development. Over
100 investors and $12 trillion in AUM are asking companies to
provide more information on labour practices to identify badly
managed workforces that are vulnerable to shocks.
As part of Liontrust’s commitment as a signatory to the WDI, the
Sustainable Investment team contacted 78 holdings in the funds to
request they respond to the WDI’s 2021 survey. Of these, 32 have
now completed the 2021 Survey. Earlier in the year, we thanked
11 companies that had already confirmed they would participate
in the 2021 Survey. Overall, investee companies participated in
the 2021 survey, equating to 20% (out of 217 entities held as at
the end of December 2021), and 33 of these received a special
mention for their transparent disclosure in 2021.
We believe that how companies manage human capital in their
direct operations, as well as workers further down their supply
chains, can affect long-term success. Our team will engage
to encourage companies to offer decent work and and
ensure they protect workers’ rights and maximise
opportunities to support employees. We will also
encourage companies to use their influence
to drive forward best practice further down
their supply chains.
20 - Liontrust Sustainable Investment: Engagement and Voting: Annual Review 2021
