Page last updated 15/01/02

West Midlands Fund backs euro voting

The £5 billion West Midlands Pension Fund has signed up to proxy voting in Europe with the European Corporate Governance Service, managed by PIRC Limited.

Brian Bailey, Finance Director of Wolverhampton City Council, who administer the West Midlands Pension Fund, said “Voting in Europe is a natural extension of our UK corporate governance strategy. The European Corporate Governance Service is best placed to provide us with the research and analysis of the key governance issues facing companies in our European Equity portfolio.”

The European Corporate Governance Service is an alliance of the leading corporate governance research and advisory groups in Europe. Pursuing a consistent governance and voting programme across Europe’s developed markets is a challenge and the ECGS is designed to simplify the process for institutional investors.

ECGS provides corporate governance analysis and proxy voting advice on companies in the FTSE Eurotop 300 index. ECGS is also currently preparing two pan-European research reports on Directors pay and corporate transparency.

The inaugural conference of the European Corporate Governance Service is being held in London at the Brewery on Friday 22 February the theme of the conference is a practical approach to pursuing a proxy voting programme.

Note: The organisations comprising the ECGS are as follows:

Further information about the service can be obtained from the website www.ecgs.net

Further information about the conference from Janice Hayward at PIRC Ltd on JaniceH@pirc.co.uk

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