Shift finds four managers backing pipelines while trailing AP2 and Scottish Widows on FPIC
A new report found that none of Canada's 11 largest pension managers has a publicly disclosed investment policy aligned with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) or its core principle of free, prior and informed consent (FPIC).
Failures to respect Indigenous rights expose financial institutions and the companies they invest in to regulatory delays, court challenges, public protests, political opposition, reputational damage, and project cost overruns.
Shift: Action for Pension Wealth and Planet Health described those risks as material to investors holding infrastructure, natural resources, real assets, and companies operating on land taken from Indigenous peoples, in its August report, Indigenous Rights and Canadian Pension Funds.
The assessment covers reconciliation action plans, proxy voting guidelines, and investment policies as of July 31, 2026.
Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, president of the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs, called on the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and other investors to show that FPIC is fully integrated into their investment decisions.
Respecting First Nations title and rights through free, prior and informed consent is “fundamental to responsible investment,” he said in Shift’s release accompanying the report.
Every manager reviewed, including the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), a Crown corporation, fell short on investment policy.
Only OPSEU Pension Trust (OPTrust) and the University Pension Plan have proxy voting guidelines Shift assessed as publicly disclosed and aligned.
Guidelines at British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI), the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS), and PSP Investments were flagged as existing but not comprehensive.
Alberta Investment Management Corporation (AIMCo) omits Indigenous rights from its 2024 and 2025 annual reports, current proxy voting guidelines, and other investment policies.
At least four managers have partnered with First Nations groups on fossil fuel infrastructure.
AIMCo holds an 85 percent stake in the Northern Courier Pipeline, which carries bitumen and diluent, with a partnership of First Nations, Métis Nations, and Suncor taking a 15 percent equity interest through the Astisiy Limited Partnership in 2021.
CPPIB-owned Wolf Midstream sold a 43 percent interest in the Access NGL Pipeline System to five Alberta-based First Nations and Métis Settlements in 2023.
BCI acted as lead investor in 2025 in support of 38 First Nations acquiring a 12.5 percent equity stake in a gas pipeline system through the Stonlasec8 Indigenous Alliance Limited Partnership's $736m bond issuance and OPTrust portfolio company Kineticor owns the Cascade gas plant with six First Nations and a consortium of infrastructure investors.
Indigenous equity participation does not on its own signal that rights issues have been resolved.
The report states that proposed projects such as LNG Canada Phase 2 and a West Coast oil pipeline may carry elements of "economic reconciliation" without FPIC from all impacted nations.
It says reconciliation-aligned investments are not necessarily climate-aligned, and that due diligence should assess holdings from both a rights-based and a climate-centred perspective.
A beneficiary at OTPP's April 2026 annual meeting asked president and chief executive officer Jo Taylor whether the fund would invest only in companies that respect FPIC.
Taylor said he would be "slightly reticent" to commit to any single set of criteria, calling it "a significant restriction" on the fund's wider investment activities.
OMERS chief legal and sustainability officer Michael Kelly, asked at the fund's April 2026 meeting about potential Ring of Fire investment, said the fund wants to ensure "that free, prior and informed consent is more than just that exercise, and that it's real and meaningful."
Shift pointed to Swedish fund Andra AP-fonden and Scottish Widows as investors that name FPIC in published expectations of investee companies.
AP2's expectations cover the right to land and to free, prior and informed consent, while Scottish Widows' stewardship policy asks investee companies to eliminate abuses of human rights, including the absence of FPIC, from their operations and supply chains.
The report recommends that pension funds refuse to back projects that cannot demonstrate the free, prior and informed consent of all impacted Indigenous communities.
