In 2022, the UK government's levelling up white paper aimed for local government pension scheme funds to invest 5% of their assets into UK infrastructure, potentially unlocking up to £16bn for communities.

Karen Shackleton was invited to join a roundtable at the LGC Investment Seminar in Cheshire, where experts discussed opportunities, challenges and the future of this ambition amid political change. 

Karen said funds are becoming more specific about their impact objectives. “Locality has definitely become narrower over the past few years. It used to be UK-wide was fine. Then we started talking about regional and now we’re talking about even closer to the doorstep.

“That of course has ramifications for the return and risk side as well; diversification of the portfolio. I’ve had conversations with my clients where it’s been really quite specific what they want to do. That it’s all around this desire to regenerate a local area or to support small businesses, or whatever it might be,” she said.

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