Our commitment to the co-operative values and principles on which we were built remains as strong as ever, with ESG principles embedded within the business every day.
Find out more about our Environmental, Social and Governance approach (PDF)
In 2023, The Co-operative Bank has once again been rated as the UK’s best Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) high street bank*.
We’re incredibly proud of the score we’ve received, confirming our place as the UK’s best rated high street bank* for ESG. With our ambitious ESG commitments, we're working to maintain this position in the future, as we strive to continually deliver our unique, customer-led ethical commitments to both customers and stakeholders.
*Rated by Morningstar Sustainalytics in the Regional Banks sub-industry with a score of 8.5 as of 9 October 2023.
Every year we create our Values and Ethics in Action: Sustainability Report to publicly showcase our ESG data and highlights from that year. As the only UK bank with a customer-led Ethical Policy, our yearly sustainability report is a great way for you to see those values and ethics in action, alongside our commitments for the year ahead.
The 3 individual areas which make up ESG are:
These 3 areas are designed to help businesses create a socially and environmentally conscious culture, which serves the people, both internally within the business and externally, ethically guides business strategies, and works to protect the environment. Creating long-term, sustainable business.
If you have enquiries as an existing investor, or want to find out more about becoming a new investor, please don't hesitate to get in touch. You can easily contact a member of our investor relations team using the details below. Learn about our work in environmental focus, social impact and governance below.
Our commitment to protecting the environment was formalised 30 years ago when we launched our Ethical Policy.
We are pleased to be rated as the UK’s best Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) high street bank by Morningstar Sustainalytics for the third consecutive year, with a score of 8.5 as of 9 October 2023 – the lower the score, the better the rating.
In 2023, we have also maintained our ratings across other ESG risk rating agencies, receiving an AAA rating from MSCI, and a Prime Rating of C with ISS, reinforcing us as a leader in ESG.
In 2022, we reduced our emissions of Greenhouse Gases (GHG) by a further 33% and reported an operational GHG emissions intensity ratio of 0.8, a significant reduction on our 2019 baseline of 2.4. Since 2007 we have offset our operational carbon emissions plus an additional 10% to address the impact of our business activities in the past and will offset our 2022 emissions in line with this commitment.
We recycled 74% of operational waste, with the remaining 26% sent to energy recovery facilities. This is a great improvement on our starting year in 2020, when only 41% of waste was recycled.
We launched a Renewable Energy Funding Scheme for business customers and…
Green Further Advances product for our retail customers with c.£315m green asset financing deployed.
We advocated for reform to combat the financing of the climate crisis by the banking industry, with our partners, Zero Hour.
We remain committed to holding co-operative principles at the heart of our business and we strive to demonstrate co-operative values in everything we do. We recognise that our impact on society goes beyond our customer base and we therefore seek to drive positive social change, working in partnership and co-operation with charities and community organisations. In 2022, we invested £1.1m in our communities through our partners.
Our colleagues remain enthusiastic volunteers, fundraisers and campaigners and we were proud to see our colleagues more than double their volunteering hours in 2022 against a 2021 baseline.
We campaigned to support survivors of economic abuse through the Online Banking Commission on Economic Abuse, and made improvements to our website to help our customers to disclose abuse.
Co-operative values and the Bank’s Ethical Policy are incorporated into the Articles of Association and established at the heart of our constitution.
The Board level Values and Ethics Committee ensures that co-operative values and the issues that are important to our customers are reflected in everything we do. It has oversight of the governance around the types of businesses we refuse banking services to, the causes we support and the issues the Bank campaigns on.
We launched our updated customer-led ethical policy, the sixth iteration since 1992.
From 2022, colleague remuneration, including that of the Executive team, is assessed annually against our internal performance scorecard. As of 2022, a proportion of our scorecard is made up of ESG performance measures, such as reducing our GHG emissions.
In 2022, we were proud to publish the sixth iteration of our customer-led Ethical Policy as well as developed a Bank's Green, Social and Sustainability Financing framework and issued our inaugural Green Bond.
Our GSS Financing Framework connects our purpose with our wholesale market financing strategy. The framework facilitates secured and unsecured funding of assets with clear environmental or social benefits that contribute to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and demonstrate our commitment to ESG and sustainable finance.
View our latest GSS Financing framework (PDF)
View our GSS Financing Framework Second Party Opinion (PDF)
View our Green Bond Allocation & Impact Report 2022 (PDF)
View our ICS Green Bond Allocation & Impact Report 2022 Second Party Opinion (PDF)
We are proud signatories of the UNEP FI’s Principles for Responsible Banking. The Principles are the world’s foremost sustainability framework for Banking. As part of our commitments we provide regular updates on our progress integrating The Principles into the Bank’s operation and strategy.
Please see our updates below:
Here at The Co-operative Bank, we know our colleagues and many of our customers are committed to driving social change in line with our Ethical Policy. Below, you can find more information and additional resources on how we support people and their communities:
Our Ethical Policy is at the very foundation of who we are, and guides everything from our policies to our business strategies. Below, you can find more information and additional resources on our governing policies and legislation:
Find out more about Our Policies and our values and ethics.
At The Co-operative Bank, our customers and their welfare is at the forefront of everything we do. If you're struggling with the rising cost of living, or managing your finances, we're here to help you find the right support:
Here at The Co-operative Bank, we’re proud to be different. We’re even prouder that it’s our ethical approach in everything we do that makes us different. And our colleagues are a fundamental part of that.
We help our colleagues connect with each other, with our customers, and with their communities. We reward them with more than just a competitive salary — offering an attractive range of benefits that support work-life balance, wellbeing, and career development.
Our diverse and competitive colleague proposition is underpinned by an environment and culture that attracts, develops, rewards, and retains talent, whilst achieving efficiency and sustainability for our bank.
Our colleague inclusion networks are sponsored by members of our Executive Team and run by colleagues, for colleagues:
Our Ethical Policy has three pillars – Planet, People and Community. Our People pillar ensures our workplace culture reflects our co-operative values and ethics by focusing on:
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