Climate Voting by Large Canadian Investors 2016-2017 /

In addition to the legal theory, it also aims to undertake a practical assessment of the materiality of these considerations, in terms of liability, and the scale, timing, probability of this and the potential implications for company and investor decision-making. [...] The Canadian partner in the Commonwealth Climate and Law Initiative (CCLI) is a joint collaboration of the Peter A. Allard School of Law, University of British Columbia and Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, focused on fiduciary obligation and climate-related financial risk, best disclosure and investment practices, and the role of financial markets in the transition to a low-carbon economy [...] The voting records of 18 Canadian institutions – eight public pension funds and ten large asset managers – were found on the institutions’ websites and examined to see how they voted on the 21 ‘key votes’ identified.  The proxy voting guidelines of surveyed institutions were examined for language that would guide voting on climate change shareholder resolutions.  The guidelines of all eight of the [...] Where this was found to be the case, the vote that was cast by the majority of funds belonging to the asset manager is the vote shown in Table 3. In cases where an equal number of funds cast votes both ‘For’ and ‘Against’, the vote is listed as “Split”. [...] Many have signed on to 2017 and 2018 global investor statements to governments on climate change, coordinated by the PRI and several other organizations, urging governments to step up their ambition and action to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement, support investment in the low-carbon transition, and improve climate-related financial disclosures.4 A new global investor initiative was announc