The High Court handed down judgment in Sarah Butler-Sloss and Others v The Charity Commission and HM Attorney General [2022] EWHC 974 (Ch) on 29 April 2022.

Maxim Cardew appeared with Edward Cumming QC for Sarah Butler-Sloss, Mark Sainsbury, and the other successful Claimants (as trustees of the Ashden Trust and the Mark Leonard Trust, part of the Sainsbury Family Charitable Trusts Network).

The issue before the Court concerned charity trustees’ duties when exercising their powers of investment, in particular the relationship between investments and charitable purposes. The Claimants sought the blessing of draft investment policies that would exclude, as far as possible, investments that were not aligned with the goals of the Paris Agreement.

Michael Green J, in blessing the draft investment policies, considered and clarified the decision in Harris v Church Commissioners for England [1992] 1 WLR 1241.