Environment, Social and Governance
Our lawyers have the breadth and depth of experience needed to guide you through the changing policy and regulatory landscape
Clients around the world rely on the team’s cutting-edge expertise in the law, and soft law applicable to those environmental issues that affect global trade and industrial activity. These include climate change policy, emissions abatement, product stewardship and decommissioning legacy management.
Our environment law team has a presence in Europe and Asia, giving it a global reach that enables us to provide comparative regulatory advice and to support transactional activity across the world.
Climate change is a critical challenge for business. Its effects are already being felt and may cause significant changes to ways of doing business and consideration of financial risk. The response to climate change also presents significant opportunities with new markets and technologies developing as part of the transition towards a climate resilient, lower carbon economy.
Our specialist climate change lawyers advise businesses on a wide variety of climate change-related issues and transactions, across all major world regions.
Showing respect for human rights, and implementing robust policies and processes to identify, prevent or mitigate adverse human rights impacts, are increasingly relevant to investor relations, brand management, access to finance, and to minimise the risk of litigation and reputational damage. When managed successfully, these can be a significant brand and business enabler.
Our cross-border Business and Human Rights practice has been at the forefront of advising on these emerging themes, including in respect of supply chain management and customer risk profiling.
Good governance is integral to the success of every business and an area of particular focus for institutional investors. We see it as central to our role as trusted advisers to help our clients meet the highest standards of governance and to be resilient to emerging risks.
Our multi-disciplinary risk and resilience and corporate governance teams deliver solutions to meet your commercial, regulatory and governance challenges to help you secure the long term sustainability of your organisation.
Green and sustainability linked loans are a hot topic in the loan markets. They are a relatively recent innovation, but volumes have risen dramatically over the past few years to over US$99bn in 2018. The rise of green and sustainability linked loans signals the early stages of a fundamental shift in the wider economy.
We have extensive experience advising on green and sustainable loan transactions. We are also at the forefront of legal and regulatory developments on ESG across Europe, Asia and the US.
17th junio 2020
Organisations may feel that they have a good-hearted culture in place but sometimes people still do bad things. We have been working with Crafty Counsel to produce a series of bite-sized videos, each aimed at exploring what culture is and why it matters through sharing what we have seen in legal practice.
26th junio 2020
ESG remains a key focus for funds, asset managers and other financial institutions and corporates. In this webinar we explore how in practice energy and infrastructure must adapt in order to transition to net zero carbon emissions by 2050.
29th mayo 2020
In this podcast we talk briefly about the move we are seeing towards conducting environmental due diligence and site visits remotely. This is something various consultants, companies and lenders have been considering for some time with some already carrying out virtual site visits. The travel restrictions imposed as a result of Covid-19 have accelerated the necessity of being able to conduct due diligence and site visits remotely.
15th abril 2020
This report aims to provide a view on key trends and challenges surrounding ESG for infrastructure funds, implications of different ESG ratings, ESG considerations in the investment cycle and credit ratings considerations, in addition to considering the outlook for ESG in the infrastructure sector and response to key issues impacting infrastructure funds.
27th marzo 2020
The UK government’s Green Finance Strategy includes a commitment to require better reporting on climate risks by listed companies. The Financial Conduct Authority has proposed a new rule to achieve this and is advising companies that existing rules may already require climate-related disclosures.
30th marzo 2020
As we pass the five-year anniversary of the entry of the UK Modern Slavery Act 2015 into force, we reflect on the implementation of the reporting regime, look at recent developments, and provide an overview of the direction of travel and international developments in this area.
15th junio 2020
Like climate change itself, it is no longer a question of if but rather when, where and in what format climate-related reporting and wider legal requirements will be felt most acutely.
23rd enero 2020
New guidance by the UK’s Serious Fraud Office sets out how the agency will take the effectiveness of an organisation’s compliance policy into account as part of an investigation into possible wrongdoing.
21st enero 2020
"Beyond the strides already being made under current EU State aid policy, the need to achieve “non-economic” environmental objectives is moving quickly up the wider social and political agenda and, in the right circumstances, should successfully trump traditional competition concerns around coordination."
13th enero 2020
Three sets of rules have been finalised by the EU which will change the way funds and their advisers approach environmental, social and governance factors when they make investments and manage their portfolios.
8th octubre 2019
The Prudential Regulatory Authority or PRA published a supervisory statement earlier this year that requires banks and insurers to begin incorporating climate related financial risk into their governance and management processes. This article originally appeared on Thomson Reuters Regulatory Intelligence, 8 October 2019.
23rd septiembre 2019
GCs share practical tips and strategies on embedding corporate values and responsible business conduct, integrating ESG factors into decision-making processes, conducting human rights due diligence, using grievance mechanisms and using sustainability principles to navigate through crises.
26th junio 2019
Green and sustainability linked loans are a hot topic in the loan markets. They are a relatively recent innovation, but volumes have risen dramatically over the past few years to over US$99bn in 2018. The rise of green and sustainability linked loans signals the early stages of a fundamental shift in the wider economy.
17th junio 2019
Rachel Barrett and Hamish McAvaney focus on human rights in the supply chain and why it’s an area of importance for companies.
13th junio 2019
Rachel Barrett and Hamish McAvaney discuss where companies should start when thinking about developing a human rights compliance framework.
30th mayo 2019
Showing respect for human rights has long been an issue for companies. However, human rights initiatives were usually seen as the remit of CSR departments.
28th febrero 2019
Exploring the law and regulation which underpins ethical behaviours of firms and individuals operating in the financial services sector.
28th abril 2016
The Guide seeks to raise the profile of General Counsel regarding the efforts they are making, and to inspire and encourage other General Counsel and Boards, senior executives and management of their respective organizations to take action and deliver long-term value.
