Social Enterprise UK has called on the Church of England to lead the way in investment in ethical and social causes.
The umbrella organisation for social enterprises was responding to an article the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams wrote in the Financial Times earlier this week in which he promoted reform of the financial system.
In the light of the Charity Commission's new investment guidance, Peter Holbrook, chief executive of Social Enterprise UK, said: “The Church of England and civil society organisations everywhere have a very specific opportunity to take action, and lead us out of the financial status quo.”
Already ‘leading the way’
In response, the Church told civilsociety.co.uk that it already has a strong ethical investment policy.
Steve Jenkins, head of media relations, said people should “have a look at our ethical investment policy and see how we are leading the way".
The Church of England’s Ethical Investment Advisory Group (EIAG) provides advice to investing bodies on steps they can take to reflect the Church’s teaching on issues such as the environment, supply chain ethics and HIV/Aids.
Restrictions currently apply to companies involved in military products and services, pornography, alcoholic drinks, gambling, tobacco, human embryonic cloning and weekly-collected home credit.
Jenkins explained that the Church of England Commissioners had been set up by an Act of Parliament to manage funds to support the Church’s activities, which includes running community projects and providing post offices and shops that could be considered social enterprise.
He added that: “Of course, there is nothing to stop our investing bodies investing in social enterprises that look like good investments.”
In a statement, Social Enterprise UK said it had looked at the Church’s ethical investment policy and added: “While the Church of England is clear about how it seeks to minimise harm through its investments, it is not clear how it could use its investments to maximise social benefit.
"It remains that the Church’s investment policy supports only shareholder business models and not those which seek to support communities more broadly.”
