 Global And Ethical Investment Advice The name that means ethical investment |
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The GÆIA Partnership
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9th July 2001
Mike Barnett meets ethical investment adviser Brigid Benson
To some people, ‘ethical’ and ‘investment’ are two words whose presence in the same sentence would be regarded as a contradiction in terms. But Brigid Benson, principal of Didsbury-based independent financial advisers Global & Ethical Investment Advice (GÆIA), disagrees. "Our claim is not to put the world to rights tomorrow," she says. "We simply attempt to insert stronger human values into the practices of big corporations."
A graduate in French and Spanish, Brigid lived for a time in Central America after leaving the University of London. It was the early ’80s, and the full effects of Ronald Reagan’s Latin American foreign policy were beginning to take their toll. "I was translating for ‘the Mothers of the Disappeared,’ she recalls, "and interpreting for people who have been tortured fills you with admiration for them."
Having seen at first-hand the consequences of the exploitation and abuses of the developing world, she went to work for a human rights pressure group upon returning to Britain. When they began to talk about paying into pension funds for its staff, it didn’t take too long for the penny to drop.
"Thatcher wanted us all to become little capitalists and hope that people would go for what would give them the greatest return, but I suddenly realised where much of our money was going to be invested - the arms trade, tobacco companies, etc. More and more people wanted to have a say in where their money was going, and I saw the potential of ethical and environmental investment advice."
Her husband was then offered a job in Manchester, and so Brigid came with him and set up GÆIA. "Insurance companies and financial institutions saw that ethical investors tended to be very well informed and highly educated people who wanted value for money. But they also care about the wider world. They’re looking ahead, because they want quality jobs for their children and their grandchildren."
Today, GÆIA is a thriving enterprise whose expansion recently saw them move to larger premises. But it wasn’t always like that. "Ten to fifteen years ago," Brigid observes, "the industry treated the ethical investment side of the market as a ‘Cinderella’ sector." Times might change, but in the end, it’s the money that does the talking. Britons have over £3bn invested in screened funds, and it is now a legal requirement for fund managers to consider the ethical issues when investing their members’ hard-earned funds.
"For our long-term survival," she concludes, "the words ‘ethical’ and ‘investment’ have to go together. People don’t want sudden change, because that’s threatening. But on the other hand, if it’s too slow or imperceptible, then people may wonder if they’re making a difference. I hope that what we’re involved with is making a difference, but that it will ultimately benefit us all."