Community Investment

Johnson Matthey is actively involved in programmes worldwide that promote good community relations to foster a relationship of understanding, trust and credibility. Guidance on site requirements is detailed in the group environment, health and safety management system. Data relating to our sites’ community investment activities and the group’s charitable donations is presented for the 2008/09 financial year.

Our strong tradition of support for communities in which our operations are based has continued during 2008/09. Our annual review of community investment activities across the group has been carried out and shows that 95% of Johnson Matthey operations with over 50 employees participate in activities within their local communities. These activities are wide ranging and include charitable giving, support for educational projects, the advancement of science and economic regeneration projects. The review also indicates that for those operations with over 50 employees that are involved in community investment activities, 100% have a nominated person responsible for this area. Looking ahead to 2009/10, the review shows that 81% of operations with over 50 employees have set objectives for their community investment activities with 71% having planned activities for the year. The review also indicates that 76% of sites with over 50 employees have specific budgets allocated to community investment activities for the 2009/10 financial year.

Johnson Matthey’s employees also participate in activities or hold community related roles outside of the work environment. The company is supportive of this broader community engagement, allowing employees time off during working hours as appropriate.

To support the further development of our community investment programmes around the world, Johnson Matthey has joined the London Benchmarking Group (LBG), a group of more than 120 major companies who develop and share best practice in this area. Through our membership of LBG, we are beginning to evaluate our community investment programmes using its successful and widely accepted model. As a first step, we have introduced more robust systems for our data collection processes which we have implemented for our 2008/09 data reporting.

Charitable Donations

Johnson Matthey’s long history of support for charitable causes continues today through group and business programmes. At a group level we operate a corporate charitable giving programme which is administered by the charity committee and coordinated on a day-to-day basis by the Director of Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. An annual report of charitable activities is made to the Chief Executive’s Committee and the causes we support are aligned with issues to which the group makes a contribution and to issues about which our employees are passionate.

In 2008/09, Johnson Matthey supported 48 charitable causes through its corporate annual donations programme. These included support for organisations working in the areas of environment, medical and health, science and education, social welfare and international development. Some 44% of these corporate donations were in support of medical and health causes. A total of 37 additional charitable causes received one-off donations through the corporate programme during the year.

In 2008/09 we initiated a specific programme of support to promote the understanding and awareness of science among children and young people. We believe that encouraging the next generation of scientists is very important to the sustainability of our industry and we will continue to contribute our resources and expertise.

During 2008/09 the company also contributed £500,000 to the University of Cambridge to support chemical engineering research, particularly in the area of catalysis and reaction engineering. Our funding will also help support construction of new chemical engineering facilities at the university.

The Johnson Matthey Educational Trust was set up in 1967 to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the founding of the company. It awards scholarships to support the university education of the offspring of Johnson Matthey employees and retired employees. During the year the Trust approved grants totalling £52,000.

Johnson Matthey continues to operate its annual charity of the year programme and employee views are considered when deciding on the charity. The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement were chosen as our charity of the year for 2008/09. Johnson Matthey sites around the world also lend support to many other charities locally and nationally through donations, employee time or loans of company facilities.

In the financial year to 31st March 2009, Johnson Matthey donated £495,000 to charitable organisations. This figure only includes donations made by Johnson Matthey and does not include payroll giving, donations made by staff or employee time. The company made no political donations in the year.

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