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Sustainability

Climate change & ESG

Climate Action & Sustainability

Climate change and sustainability are set to be defining issues of this decade. As a future facing law firm, we are committed to addressing our own impact on the environment and approach to sustainability, as well as advising clients with their related legal needs. 

This section of Insight draws together the very latest hot topics, issues, analysis and advice from CMS lawyers across a broad range of Sustainability topics.

 

01/09/2022
ESG Hub
ESG factors have moved from being a niche concern to a strategic board level priority across all sectors and jurisdictions. Whether a business is a financial institution, an energy company, or a tech start-up – all companies with a future must now focus on ESG as a business imperative. 

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05/03/2024
Plastics and packaging laws in Slovakia
1. What is the general legislative framework regulating packaging and plastic waste in your jurisdiction? Act No. 79/2015 Coll. on Waste and on the amendment to certain acts (the “Waste Act”) is...
Comparable
28/06/2023
Tomorrow
Taking the long view Even in challenging times, real estate investors continue to have a strong degree of confidence in the future of the sector.
22/06/2023
Workforce reporting
Reporting on workforce data is one way of measuring the social aspect of ESG. Gender pay gap reporting is probably the most popular method but there are other ways that an organisation can publish workforce data to enhance their ESG credentials.  Apart from gender pay and some aspects of corporate governance, workforce reporting is a largely unregulated area of the law. Employers currently have a choice about what information they publish. We believe that will change in time. The direction of travel is towards greater transparency and more data, as the EU has shown in adopting the Pay Transparency Directive. Although this Directive will not apply to the UK when it is implemented in three years’ time, we envisage it will have an impact in the EU with multinationals who operate across the EU and the UK.
14/06/2023
London
The majority of UK real estate professionals continue to believe that London is overvalued. As our chart shows, this is very much business as usual. Over the past eight years, only 2021 - when investors began to wonder what a post-covid market might look like - has challenged the status quo. Even then, what we saw was only a significant narrowing of the gap, not a reversal. In this year’s polling, 62% of our respondents feel London is overvalued, as opposed to 6% who believe it is undervalued. These are the most bearish numbers we have seen since pre‑Brexit days.
14/06/2023
Sustainable offices and EPC requirements
Investors may be moving towards the view that making offices sustainable does not necessarily equate to higher costs for occupiers.
14/06/2023
The view from the UK
Every year we ask a cross-section of leading UK real estate professionals for their views on the market. This year we polled 270 experts, including 62 investors and 54 developers. In many ways they share the outlook of the global investors we surveyed, with long-term confidence tempered by short-term concerns. Overall, 38% reported feeling optimistic about the market, while 34% describe themselves as neutral and 28% are pessimistic. Although positive, this take on the market is unsurprisingly more cautious than the one we found 12 months ago, with sentiment falling back to levels last seen at the beginning of the pandemic as the more bullish outlook of the past two years recedes.
14/06/2023
Global cities
As our chart shows, the genuinely ‘global’ cities remain the most appealing (albeit by slim margins), with the top four slots going to London, Paris, Tokyo and New York.
14/06/2023
The big picture
Despite a difficult year and an uncertain outlook, we found strong underlying positives among investors globally.
06/06/2023
Other UK cities
Looking at the rest of the UK, Manchester still remains on top of our ranking of regional cities, popular with 58% of UK professionals.
06/06/2023
Asset classes
Given the strong demand/supply imbalance, it is no surprise to see ‘living’ asset classes take the top spots when professionals are asked which sectors they favour.
06/06/2023
Technology
Many in the real estate industry are keen to embrace technological innovations, including the latest green technologies.
06/06/2023
Future Planning?
One thing nearly all our UK respondents agree on is that the planning system is not working and needs investment. A massive 90% say the system is slowing down real estate development, while 93% reckon it is under-resourced.