Institutional Investor Committee update

There isn't one, it doesn't seem to have done anything since last June. Over the period since then we have seen the Kay Review start, BIS consult on and then set out new ideas on executive remuneration reform, and a protracted public debate about bonuses in banks where the state is a shareholder.

These are all issues where UK institutional investors have a clear interest, and where a body claiming to act on their behalf would intervene. But I don't think there has even been a press release since last June (when it was relaunched, minus the AIC).

What's more it appears that the IIC isn't representing institutional shareholders behind the scenes either. Here's the Government's response to a written question by Lord Myners:

Asked by Lord Myners

To ask Her Majesty's Government whether Ministers or officials from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have had any recent meetings with the Institutional Investor Committee in connection with pay at banks in which the Government are a shareholder.[HL15416]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Baroness Wilcox): No Ministers or officials from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have met with the Institutional Investor Committee on this issue. Government's ownership responsibilities of banks are discharged by HM Treasury through UK Financial Investments Ltd.

They told him the same story just over a year ago year:

Asked by Lord Myners

To ask Her Majesty's Government on how many occasions in the last six months Ministers and senior officials from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills have met with the Institutional Investor Council.[HL5259]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (Baroness Wilcox): There have been no occasions when Ministers or the Permanent Secretary have met the Institutional Investor Council. Information on meetings with other senior officials is not held centrally and could be obtained only at disproportionate cost.

So it's a body that doesn't say anything publicly on issues of importance to institutional shareholders, and doesn't meet - as the IIC - with the government department now undertaking various streams of work of relevance. What does it actually do then? And if the answer is "nothing much" why not just scrap it rather than maintaining the illusion that we have a peak organisation representing institutional shareholders?