Pilita Clark rightly chastises the “specious campaigns against so-called ‘woke capitalism’” that are causing big companies to pull back from taking serious action on climate change (“Orwellian doublethink is killing climate action”, Opinion, March 20).
However the picture as regards environmental, social and governance investment practices is not quite so clear cut.
Recently I was informed by a large fund manager that my investments were being transferred into a fund which met certain ESG standards. This included avoiding any investments in defence companies. When I wrote pointing out that investing in defence companies was rather important at the moment I got a stock answer telling me that because some defence companies sell weapons to dubious regimes no investments would be made in any defence companies.
There are two problems with this. First climate change and defence sales are completely separate issues and muddling them up blunts the focus of climate action.
Second, I expect large fund managers to be able to exercise some discretion in how they invest, not make blanket exclusions.
I sold my shares in the fund.
John Alty
London E9, UK
