The PLSA has unveiled a substantial update to its Vote Reporting Template at its Investment Conference in Edinburgh, aiming to cut costs and improve transparency in stewardship.
The Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA) unveiled a substantial update to its Vote Reporting Template yesterday (12 March) at its Investment Conference in Edinburgh.
The template has been developed by the Vote Reporting Group, which was set up by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in 2022 and is co-chaired by Railpen’s Caroline Escott and Scottish Widows’ Shipra Gupta.
The update combines a template constructed by the Vote Reporting Group with an existing model developed by the PLSA in 2020.
By streamlining reporting, the association said it hoped to improve consistency and transparency of voting activity as well as lower costs for asset managers.
New features include standard vote category fields and a “narrative rationale” field to allow managers to explain their rationale for voting decisions on significant issues.
Joe Dabrowski, deputy director of policy at the PLSA, said the new template would help streamline vote reporting for asset managers and give asset owners better quality information, facilitating a more useful dialogue between parties on shareholder issues.
“By improving transparency and accountability we aim to lift stewardship standards across the industry to the benefit of savers,” Dabrowski said.
Speaking at the PLSA Investment Conference, Escott encouraged asset managers to embrace the template and use it to communicate “narratives” around certain voting activity to demonstrate engagement.
“I’m very much hoping that the demand from clients, the recognition that it is good to have better and more consistent transparency of voting information across the activities that they undertake on clients’ behalf, is a really good thing,” she said.
The FCA has endorsed the template and called for asset managers to adopt it. Sacha Sadan, director of sustainable finance at the regulator, told delegates that it would soon be asking asset managers whether they were using the template – and if not, why not.
“The FCA will be watching like a hawk to make sure it gets take up,” Sadan said. “And we’re not the only ones watching it – I know that ministers and other [policymakers] have been saying that we should legislate. It’s an area that is never going to go away.”
