Firetop

I popped into Marks and Spencer on Saturday and whilst paying for my goods spotted a leafet on the M&S Ethical Fund. On closer inspection of the leaflet I discovered that Ethical Funds are about as Ethical as unlimited broadband is ‘unlimited’ from many suppliers. On the face of it M&S is offering a rebranded Jupiter Asset Management service which sees investments avoided in companies with a poor environmental record or involved in the arms trade, gambling, animal testing / fur, tobacco and pornography. However, the small print says ‘A company that derives over 10% of its turnover from any one of these activities will not be invested in’. So it should really be called the M&S Almost Ethical Fund - as part of your money could go into those industries.

Now don’t get me wrong, M&S should be applauded for its sentiment, especially as a fifteen minute search of the Web yielded no genuine 100% ethical investment portfolios anywhere in the world. However, I’m not sure anybody should be misleading the public by calling something black or white when in fact it’s a bit grey. Realistically if you are a concerned ethical investor a Green Fund (investing in Green service companies) or a Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) fund (investing in companies demonstrating ethical practices) is as good as it gets. It’s worth a visit to Jupiter Online to find out more - bypassing Marks and Spencer completely.

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