Scottish Life makes changes to Europe Specialist Pension Fund

Scottish Life, the pensions specialist arm of the Royal London Group, has announced that from 2 May 2011, the underlying investment within the Scottish Life Europe Specialist Pension Fund will change from Artemis European Growth to Neptune European Opportunities.

This change reflects Scottish Life's commitment to strong and effective investment governance.

The Scottish Life Europe Specialist Pension Fund is part of a group of externally managed equity funds categorised by sector and risk relative to a benchmark.  The process of replacing an underlying fund has been designed to be a seamless transition and includes proactive communication with advisers and policyholders prior to any change being made.

Lorna Blyth, Investment Marketing Manager at Scottish Life, commented: "We take a proactive role in the governance of our investment fund range and we're committed to providing advisers and their clients with strong performing funds.  With this in mind we have taken the decision to replace the underlying investment with the Neptune European Opportunities Fund.  This fund has a long track record of strong performance and is managed by a market-leading investment house.  We believe that the manager's style and process is better suited to deliver consistent performance in different market conditions, and are confident that this decision will have a positive impact for policyholders.

"Effective governance is now rightly at the heart of the regulator's agenda for the financial services industry.  At Scottish Life, it lies at the heart of our investment proposition and our governance framework is designed to ensure that our policyholders long-term savings' aims will be met in an appropriate manner and reviewed regularly."