Global Stewardship Committee

Catherine McCall
Canadian Coalition for Good Governance

Committee Chair

Catherine McCall is the Executive Director of the Canadian Coalition for Good Governance. Representing Canada’s leading institutional investors, which collectively manage assets of approximately CAD $5 trillion, the Coalition’s mandate is to improve corporate governance, including as it relates to environmental and social matters, at Canadian public companies and to assist institutional investors in meeting their stewardship responsibilities. CCGG also engages in policy development and works toward the enhancement of the regulatory environment to best align the interests of boards and management with those of their investors. As Executive Director, Catherine is responsible, together with the Board of Directors, for setting the strategy of the organization, leading policy development and participating in CCGG’s board engagement program. She is a member of the Ontario Securities Commission’s Continuous Disclosure Advisory Committee.

Peter Dervan
Manulife Investment Management

Pete is part of the ESG Team at Manulife Investment Management where his responsibilities include shepherding proxy voting policy and procedure, stewardship thought leadership, and sustainability reporting. Pete collaborates with investment professionals on proxy voting and engagement decisions, manages the proxy voting vendor relationship, drafts responses to regulatory and standard setter consultations, and develops content for PRI reporting and Manulife Investment Management’s separate stewardship and sustainable investment reports. Prior to his work at Manulife Investment Management, Pete was on the Proxy Voting Team at Fidelity Investments where he reviewed and executed voting decisions, engaged with issuers and developed voting policy.

Stephen Erlichman

Fasken

Steve has practiced corporate and securities law throughout his career at major law firms in New York and Toronto and since 1999 has been a partner at Fasken, an international law firm with over 800 lawyers. He co-founded Fasken’s ESG & Sustainability group and spends substantial time on ESG matters. Steve has advised management, boards of directors and shareholders of public and private companies in various industries as well as investment dealers, commercial banks, insurance companies, private equity firms and managers of mutual funds, pension funds and hedge funds. He was the Executive Director of the Canadian Coalition for Good Governance from 2011-2018, and since 2021 he has been Chair, ESG at Middlefield Limited, a Canadian asset manager.

Steve has spoken and written widely, and been extensively interviewed by TV, radio, and newspapers on many corporate, securities, and ESG topics. His report “Making it Mutual: Aligning the Interests of Investors and Managers – Recommendations for a Mutual Fund Governance Regime for Canada” was referred to by the press as a “landmark report on fund governance” and utilized by the Canadian Securities Administrators in establishing a fund governance regime for Canada. Global Proxy Watch named Steve one of the “10 people around the world who have had the most impact on corporate governance” in 2016.

Steve is a Director of Canada’s Responsible Investment Association (RIA), a Director and former President of the Harvard Business School Club of Toronto, a member of ICGN’s Global Stewardship Committee and was a member of ICGN’s Shareholder Rights Committee as well as the inaugural co-chair of ICGN’s Global Network of Investor Associations.

Steve has law degrees from University of Toronto and New York University, an M.B.A. from Harvard University, the RIA’s Responsible Investment Professional Certification and the certificate in Sustainable Capitalism & ESG from UC Berkeley Law.

Steven Friel

Woodsford 

Steven Friel, CEO of Woodsford, is a leader in the law and business of ESG, and one of the most well-established litigation finance professionals in the international market. He is particularly expert in helping to organise large groups of shareholders, bondholders and other stakeholders in the face of catastrophic breakdowns in ESG at publicly listed companies. Steven has been the driving force behind Woodsford’s evolution into the leading funder of ESG-related shareholder engagements globally; in particular in the UK, Australia, continental Europe, Japan and Canada. Steven has repeatedly been ranked by independent directories as a leader in the field. Before joining Woodsford, Steven was a partner in the London office of international law firm Brown Rudnick.  

Steven is a graduate of Cambridge University, and graduated top of his class with a Master of Laws degree in International Dispute Resolution from the University of London. Steven was listed as one of the ‘PwC – Top 10 Inspirational leaders 2020’ by the British LGBT Awards. He has been recognised as an LGBT Great role model by the main global membership organisation specialist in developing LGBT+ diversity and inclusion within the investment and savings industry. 

Robert Lewenson
Old Mutual Investment Group

Robert joined the Old Mutual Investment Group Responsible Investment team in October 2014, as a Governance and Engagement Manager. He is responsible for proxy voting and engagement, representing Old Mutual Investment Group on various industry bodies and championing responsible investment for the OM group. Robert’s legal and corporate governance background enables him to bring his knowledge of law and negotiation skills to the fore in promoting clients’ interests. Prior to joining the Responsible Investment team, he was a legal advisor at Old Mutual Investment Group for seven years. Robert has fourteen years of work experience in the legal profession and asset management industry.  He is a member of the Board of Governors of the ICGN. He holds a BBusSci LLB (UCT) and is an Attorney of the High Court.

Chirag Mehta

Quantum AM

Mr. Chirag Mehta is currently the Chief Investment Officer at Quantum Asset Management Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Quantum Advisors. He has two  decades of experience specializing in  alternative investment strategies. He currently manages the Quantum India ESG Equity Fund, a very first ever Indian ESG fund that was built on a proprietary ESG framework. Chirag has been formerly ranked as the 4th best performing Fund Manager in the world under the age of 40 by Citywire in 2017. Chirag spearheads Quantum’s efforts in the world of responsible investment and extensively engages with the Government, policymakers and companies to further sustainable finance in Indian markets. 

Chirag is currently part of a government led task force to contribute on enhancing over all Sustainable Finance in India. He is also a member of the advisory board of Workforce Disclosure Initiative, part of the Share action group and an  active member of CDP India – Sustainable Finance working group. He is also a member of Green Finance Leadership Initiative and the India SIF. He is also an active voting member of The Lab that identifies, develops, and launches innovative finance solutions that can drive billions in private investment to action on climate change. 

Fuyumi Takeuchi

Nomura Asset Management

Fuyumi is currently a Senior ESG Specialist as part of Nomura Asset Management (NAM)’s Responsible Investment Department based in Tokyo, Japan, where she handles proxy voting, engagement with Japanese and foreign companies, and ESG initiatives. NAM is a leader in responsible investment across Japan and Asia with a history of over 20 years in this area. Prior to joining NAM, she worked for STOXX, a European index provider where she led and expanded their Japan business. Before moving back to Japan in 2018, Fuyumi worked in Hong Kong for Novus Aviation Capital a multinational aircraft leasing firm headquartered in Dubai. She started her career as a financial journalist at Nikkei covering multiple sectors and equity markets. Fuyumi also represented Nikkei in Hong Kong for several years as an economic news reporter covering Greater China.  

She is a member of PRI Japan Advisory Committee. She holds a Bachelor of Human Life and Environmental Science from Ochanomizu University in Japan.  

David Trenchard

Elliott Advisors (UK) Limited

David is the Engagement Director of Elliott Advisors (UK) Limited, having joined them in 2022 to work with them on all aspects of shareholder engagement and stewardship. Prior to Elliott, he has had a long career in investment banking, communications and activist investing, most recently working as an independent consultant in the fields of corporate governance and shareholder engagement. He is also a Non-Executive Director of Integrum ESG Ltd. David served two terms as a Member of Council at the Institute of Directors (IoD), also sitting on the Audit and Risk Committee. On stepping down from that role, David was invited to join the Advisory Board of the IoD’s Centre for Corporate Governance. He had previously spent 25 years in investment banking – mostly at Morgan Stanley – where he held various senior posts in equity sales, capital markets and investment banking in Europe, North America and Asia. Latterly at Morgan Stanley he was a London-based Managing Director in Equity Capital Markets and Head of Corporate Broking