End of an era: reflecting on the legacy of ACCESS and Brunel

Written By:

Thomas Parker
Lead Writer
LAPF Investments

As ACCESS and Brunel wind down, we examine the legacy of two pools that took very different paths to the same goal

When Rachel Reeves stood up to make her first Mansion House speech as chancellor, nobody could have predicted the shockwaves it would cause for the LGPS. She described the UK pensions landscape as “highly fragmented”, limiting the ability of large pension funds to invest at scale into productive assets – announcing that, in the Pension Schemes Bill, it would legislate for “significant consolidation” in the UK pensions market.

This led to the Fit for the Future consultation and eventually led two pools – ACCESS and Brunel – to wind down, leaving 21 funds with more than £100 billion worth of assets under management homeless.

Origins of pooling

The concept of pooling – at least in its current, formalised state – dates back to the 2015 summer budget, then-chancellor George Osborne and his Conservative government’s first since their election victory in May of that year.

While not formally expressed in his speech, the accompanying documentation made clear why the government wanted pooling: “The government will work with Local Government Pension Scheme administering authorities to ensure that they pool investments to significantly reduce costs, while maintaining overall investment performance.”

This was further formalised in post-Autumn budget documents, publishing guidance for pooling LGPS fund assets into up to six “British Wealth Funds”. The move to eight came from the funds themselves – generally grouping based on geography, reducing governance friction, and reflecting existing partnerships between funds.

Brunel planted its flag in the south west of England, naming the pool after famed Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel. ACCESS (a collaboration of Central, Eastern and Southern Shires), meanwhile, found its footing in the east and south east of England.

Two pools, two different ways of doing things

Despite bordering one another, the approach each pool took couldn’t have been more different – symbolic, in microcosm, of the two broad approaches LGPS pools had taken more widely.

Brunel was set up as an FCA-authorised investment management company with internal investment teams, mirroring the structure of a mainstream regulated asset manager.

Describing why the pool took this approach, chief executive Laura Chappell said: “We chose the most effective operating model for our size and ambitions, within the regulations set out by the FCA.”

Brunel’s business case held that only a centralised entity could consolidate duplicated work, support complex portfolio functions, and provide unified reporting and oversight.

When it came to governance, the pool adopted a shareholder model where each fund owned 10% of the new company, exercised through a shareholders’ agreement with reserved matters requiring unanimous or majority approval.

ACCESS was built on ideas of cooperation, shared decision-making and – most crucially – preserving fund sovereignty and avoiding heavy centralisation.

As the funds in the pool had broadly similar investment strategies and funding positions, and shared a core group of asset managers, they didn’t see the need for a centralised investment company.

Its business case explained: “We are 11 like-minded Local Government Pension Scheme Authorities who have formed a collaboration to collectively invest, achieving greater cost efficiency and delivering strong performance.”

Explicitly framed as a “low cost, low-infrastructure pool”, its model avoided creating an FCA-regulated investment company, instead relying on an outsourced operator, a joint committee, a shared governance framework, and collaboration across funds.

Investment philosophy and success stories

Brunel quickly established themselves as trailblazers in the responsible investment space in the LGPS world, a position built on strong foundations – the funds joining the pool were among the most RI-engaged even before the pooling era.

Faith Ward, who had been working at the Environment Agency before joining Brunel, was a key driving force in this regard, and brought with her a depth of expertise that helped shape Brunel’s approach from the outset.

As the pool’s 2025 Responsible Investment and Stewardship Outcomes report set out, 92% of all assets were covered by objectives and targets aligned with the Paris Accord, while 32% were invested in the UK.

Climate-related risk was one of the top-priority risks owned by the chief executive, with oversight embedded into quarterly reporting and escalation processes.

Much of this work was driven by Faith Ward, who joined the pool as its Chief Responsible Investment Officer.

Explaining Brunel’s approach to RI strategy in an interview last year with LAPF Investments, she said: “We must accept we can’t do everything and focus on where we add most value. The industry is learning to be more targeted while collaborating to ensure all areas are covered by those best suited, based on their skills or mandates.”

Climate-related investments formed a standing part of the pool’s Strategic Executive Committee agenda, with several indicators monitored in detail – including failures to meet regulatory or policy commitments, reputational risk linked to climate, and asset managers placed “on watch” for climate-related concerns.

This tied into Brunel’s Climate Change Policy 2023–2030, underpinned by a rigorous engagement programme covering 100% of its investment managers.

It led to all listed portfolios achieving at least 7% per annum emissions reductions from a 2019 baseline – the implied annual trajectory required to achieve a 50% reduction in emissions exposure by 2030 – with the aggregate portfolio achieving a 60% reduction between 2019 and 2024.

Brunel’s environmental commitment extended beyond climate into nature and biodiversity, being named as one of the early adopters of the Taskforce for Nature-Related Financial Disclosures framework at the World Economic Forum in January 2024.

The pool was also a founding investor in the Greencoat Renewable Income fund, which has invested £1.1 billion in more than 140 solar farms, three offshore wind farms and four UK energy-from-waste wood assets, and funded NeuConnect – the first electricity interconnector linking the UK to Germany.

Brunel’s private markets programme was also a significant achievement. Over seven years, the team deployed £8 billion into new investments across five private market asset classes and took on management of a further £2 billion in property investments, with more than 33% of the partnership’s investments now in private markets, compared to just 15% before Brunel was formed.

This included a £150 million commitment to 1,365 affordable family houses and 321 apartments across 29 schemes, with rents set at 22% of average local household income.

Responsible investment was also a key priority for ACCESS, with the pool becoming a UK Stewardship Code signatory in 2024/25. In total, ACCESS voted at 2,439 company meetings across 37,473 resolutions in 2024/25 alone, with its collaboration with PIRC helping to overhaul its ESG and stewardship guidelines and improve reporting standards.

By late 2025, ACCESS had reached £55 billion in pooled assets across its 11 partner funds, with more than 75% of all assets from partner funds on the platform and over £10 billion invested within the UK. Performance of active listed assets across all sub funds in the £33 billion ACS was positive with an annualised combined return of 10.2% compared to a benchmark of 9.1% as of 31 December 2025.

Independent analysis of 2023 CTi data by ClearGlass confirmed the pool achieved over £49 million of fee savings – equivalent to 17 basis points – for its partner funds compared to fees in the open market.

The pool also developed a substantial investment programme across real estate, infrastructure, natural capital and social housing.

Its planned real estate programme included a £1.3 billion property fund run by CBRE Investment Management and a £100 million impact real estate fund run by Orchard Street Investment Management, alongside backing for an affordable housing fund managed by Legal & General Investment Management.

Its infrastructure allocation stands at £2.3 billion in committed to two infrastructure fund vehicles managed by IFM Investors and J.P. Morgan, covering transportation, social infrastructure, energy and telecommunications utilities, alongside over £700 million in timber assets.

Its governance structure played a key part in directing investment. The Joint Committee set the shared strategic direction, while section 151 officers ensured investment proposals were properly scrutinised.

This led to the pool investing in local projects across the 11 funds, including industrial redevelopments in Harlow and Romford, a retail park upgrade in Worthing, and three UK-based airports as part of its wider infrastructure allocation.

Pooling reform

All of this was unfolding just as Rachel Reeves’ Mansion House speech landed.

She said: “We will legislate on measures to consolidate the Local Government Pension Scheme, one of the largest pension schemes in world, and require that the 86 Local Government Pension Scheme administering authorities consolidate all their assets into eight pools.”

On the face of it, the use of the phrase “eight pools” suggests it was the government’s intention – at least initially – to retain all eight pools, but industry rumours from the time suggest this was far from the case.

This speculation intensified when, in July 2024, the Pensions Investment Review was launched, with the Chancellor citing “fragmentation and waste” as a core concern.

Upon publication of Fit for the Future, the government did state it wanted to retain all eight pools, making clear “for the avoidance of doubt, government is not seeking to use this process to move to a single pool for all AAs”.

However, it did frame mergers as one option among several, encouraging pools to “carefully consider all options”.

It also called on each pool to demonstrate why a merger would not be a more cost-effective approach – a point the LGPS Advisory Board called on the government to be more transparent about before the consultation closed.

How did Brunel and ACCESS respond to Fit for the Future?

On the question of consolidation, ACCESS said the build option was the superior route, describing it as “demanding but deliverable”.

It argued merger activity, by necessity, required the participation of multiple parties and often took more than a year, but emphasised it was not starting from scratch, with plans to create a new FCA-regulated investment company leveraging its existing seven-year infrastructure.

Brunel’s response rested primarily on its track record, outlining how the pool had already met several of the government’s pooling targets – including the fact that 32% of all pooled assets were invested in the UK, three times the Mansion House Compact of 10%.

On consolidation and mergers, Brunel pushed for a process that was “transparent, fair, evidenced and fully costed.”

Both responses were ultimately rejected, albeit for markedly different reasons. For ACCESS, ministers cited concerns about costs – claiming the pool’s were “among the highest in the LGPS” – as well as the deliverability of setting up an FCA-authorised company in the given timeframe.

ACCESS flatly rejected the cost claim and asked the government to share its data source. It also referenced the work undertaken by ClearGlass, adding that its plans were “very similar” to plans by others which had been accepted.

The pool said it was “left with the impression that the reasons given for the government’s decision are based on assertions that are open to question or appear to lack supporting evidence.”

Brunel’s rejection remains even more opaque, with the pool saying the criteria ministers used “remain unclear given our significant progress across all the key pooling priorities set out when pooling began”.

The government refused freedom of information requests to release the rejection letters, but a report to the Avon Pension Fund revealed the stated reasons included “limited in-house asset management expertise, low scale, and limited merger appetite.”

In response, Laura Chappell said: “In short, we did not simply meet the initial aims of pooling: we exceeded those aims and blazed a trail in responsible investment across the global asset owner space.”

Post-Fit for the Future

Once it was clear the government wasn’t going to reverse its decision, ACCESS turned its focus on managing the transition for its partner funds, confirming in August last year that its 11 partner funds were “progressing towards key decisions” and were unlikely to select all the same pooling partner.

Driven through the ACCESS Support Unit, the pool coordinated governance, managed contracts, and supported partner funds through their due diligence processes.

The destinations were settled relatively quickly – within two weeks in August. Seven funds – Cambridgeshire, East Sussex, Essex, Hertfordshire, Kent, Northamptonshire and West Sussex – entered exclusive discussions to join Border to Coast, while the remaining four – Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Norfolk and Suffolk – went to LGPS Central.

Brunel’s post-rebuttal trajectory was more operationally consequential, given it had a staffed investment management business that needed to find a home.

LPPI emerged as the leading contender for taking on this infrastructure, opening a new Bristol office to support the ex-Brunel funds and advertising 18 new roles, initially offered to Brunel staff in the first instance.

The continuity between the two organisations is also reflected at board level: Roelie van Wijk, who served as a non-executive director at Brunel and sat on its Investment Oversight Committee, has been appointed as a non-executive director at LPPI.

As for the orphaned Brunel funds, these were far more disparately distributed than those of ACCESS. Wiltshire was the first of all 21 funds to declare, choosing LGPS Central, followed by Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire.

Devon was first to declare for LPPI, followed by Somerset, Dorset, Avon, Cornwall and the Environment Agency. Buckinghamshire, meanwhile, chose London CIV – making it the sole orphaned fund not to end up at Border to Coast, LGPS Central or LPPI.

What’s the legacy of the two pools?

Whatever the reasoning behind their dissolution, the legacy of Brunel and ACCESS will ultimately be defined by the work they carried out during the formative years of LGPS pooling.

For Brunel, that legacy lies in how it embedded responsible investment at scale within a large public pension pool. Climate risk was elevated to a core strategic issue, emissions reduction targets were applied across listed portfolios, and stewardship became a systematic process rather than a reactive exercise.

Through extensive engagement programmes and clear portfolio-level targets, Brunel helped demonstrate how an LGPS pool could use its scale to influence corporate behaviour while aligning portfolios with the transition to a lower-carbon economy.

Those principles were also reflected in its investment activity, with significant capital committed to renewable infrastructure and energy transition assets, including solar, offshore wind and emerging technologies such as green hydrogen.

ACCESS leaves a legacy shaped by a different kind of impact. Through its collaborative governance model, it created a platform for local authorities to collectively deploy capital into listed assets, infrastructure, real estate and social impact investments while maintaining a strong degree of fund involvement in decision-making.

Its commitments to affordable and energy-efficient housing became a defining feature of the pool’s work, helping channel substantial pension capital into developments delivering both long-term income and wider social value.

Together, the two pools helped shape how LGPS capital was deployed during the first decade of pooling – from climate-aligned investment and corporate stewardship to infrastructure, housing and regional development.

While the pools themselves will disappear from the structure of the scheme, the investments they backed and the standards they helped establish are likely to endure long after their formal wind-down.