London Borough of Islington Pension Fund

The London Borough of Islington Council acts as the administering authority, with an in-house pensions team and a pension board that oversees strategy. Specific investment decisions are delegated to the London Collective Investment Vehicle (London CIV) for pooled mandates, while the council retains governance over manager selection and asset allocation through its pension committee.

Primarily through the London CIV, which selects and monitors external fund managers on behalf of its 32 participating London boroughs. The CIV uses an authorized contractual scheme (ACS) structure to create tax-transparent sub-funds. Islington has also committed directly to some strategies such as Pantheon secondaries funds, but the London CIV is its primary gateway to institutional private equity, infrastructure, real estate, and private credit.

The fund takes significant global exposure. Confirmed commitments include Quinbrook funds that invest in renewable energy assets in the US, UK, and Australia. Churchill Asset Management provides US middle-market direct lending. Pantheon pursues global private equity secondaries. European credit comes via Permira Credit Solutions, and the Franklin Templeton real estate funds are global mandates. The London CIV platform deliberately seeks diversification across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific.

Islington was a founding shareholder in the London CIV when it launched in 2015. The CIV is an FCA-regulated collective investment scheme designed to pool assets from London's 32 boroughs and the City of London Corporation. It enables smaller borough pension funds — many below £1 billion — to access institutional-quality managers and negotiate lower fees by aggregating demand.

The fund maintains memberships in three stewardship groups: the Local Authorities Pension Fund Forum (LAPFF) for direct company engagement, the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change (IIGCC) for climate investment strategy, and Pensions for Purpose, which focuses on impact measurement. Portfolio-level evidence includes commitments to Quinbrook's net-zero and low-carbon power funds and participation in the London CIV's governance framework, which increasingly incorporates climate risk metrics.

The fund targets real estate through global closed-end funds (Franklin Templeton series), renewable infrastructure via Quinbrook's net-zero and low-carbon strategies, private credit across US middle-market direct lending (Churchill), European credit (Permira), and global opportunistic credit (Crescent), plus private equity secondaries and fund-of-funds through Pantheon. Stage-wise, it favors value-add real estate, growth infrastructure, and buyout credit, largely through primary fund commitments rather than direct co-investments.

Not directly. As a Local Government Pension Scheme fund, Islington Pension Fund's sole fiduciary mandate is to pay member benefits. It does, however, participate in impact-themed investments through its climate and renewable energy commitments and its membership in Pensions for Purpose, which emphasizes social and environmental returns alongside financial performance.