Agenda item

Report of the Town Clerk.

(To be read in conjunction with the confidential appendix at Item X, to follow).

The Committee considered a report of the Town Clerk which contained a scoped and costed Climate Action Strategy for the City of London Corporation.

Introducing the report, the Chair reminded the Committee that this strategy would affect City Fund, City Cash, and Bridge House Estates; consequently, Members would need to mindful of their roles in respect of the City Corporation funds and Trustees of Bridge House Estates when considering the proposals. She also took the opportunity to thank Deputy Keith Bottomley, Alderman Alison Gowman, and Deputy Jamie Ingham Clark for their efforts in ensuring engagement across the Court in producing this strategy.

A Member spoke to relay comments made at the most recent meeting of the Financial Investment Board in relation to this strategy, where Members had been very supportive of the strategy overall but did raise points of caution in relation to navigating the short term and in not moving too quickly into “green-washed” products or radical strategic allocation changes.

In response to a query in relation to governance, it was clarified that reporting in respect of implementation and delivery would continue to be to the Policy and Resources Committee, pending any further decisions made through the Governance Review process. There had been a suggestion that continued Member Briefings and training sessions might also be beneficial too.

Following a further question as to delivery timescales, it was confirmed that delivery could be accelerated as opportunities presented themselves, with it noted that the strategy presented a very detailed set of actions with specific timescales and plans being set annually which would allow individual aspects to be stepped up where possible.

RESOLVED: That:-

1.         The draft strategy, set out at Appendix 1 to the report, together with the action sets at Appendix 2, be approved.

2.         The allocation of additional budget required to deliver the Strategy be approved, as recommended by the Resources Allocation Sub Committee (RASC) and shown at Confidential Appendix 3 to the report, be approved.