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Unit Trusts were first designed over 70 years ago specifically to give individual investors a simple and inexpensive method of investing in company shares.

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Celebrating 50 years of unions investing in the City

Back in the early 1960s the idea that unions and their members should play the stock markets and make capital work in the interests of labour was unheard of.

But thanks to the efforts of the late Lord Hirshfield who was prepared to embrace the then inconceivable concept of the city and unions operating on the same side of the fence, the Trade Union Fund Managers (TUFM) was born.

Today (Thursday) 50 years on TUFM is still going strong – the Congress House-based firm is currently managing funds in excess of £75 million – and celebrating its half a century with a special lunchtime birthday reception at the House of Lords.

What sets TUTM apart from its competitors is its board – which is made up of representatives from some of the best investment minds in the city and from the senior names from across the union movement. Directors include Baroness Prosser, formerly of the TGWU, John Hannett and Paul Noon, the General Secretaries of USDAW and Prospect.

TUFM is also different to other firms playing the stock market as any profits earned by its management company are put into a charitable trust, and the trustees who decide where the money goes are all trade unionists.

Regular charities supported by the TUUT Charitable Trust include the Macmillan Cancer Fund, MEAK (Medical and Educational Aid to Kenya), and ASP (the Adur Special Needs Project). Other monies donated by the Trust include funds for a neonatal unit at the Evelina Children's Hospital in London, money to help disabled people take up sport and cash to help people affected by sight loss back into work.

Current TUFM Chairman Lord Christopher – who used to be General Secretary of the IRSF (which has now become part of PCS) – said: "Since the early 1960s we've been growing in size, responsibly investing on behalf of unions and individual members, and supporting a wide range of charities which do much good around the globe.

"With an emphasis on service, rather than profit, we're hopeful that we can continue to prosper and look forward to working hand in hand with the trade union movement for another 50 years."

TUFM General Manager Marion Colverd said: "More recently, TUFM has launched a new subsidiary TU Additions which offers bespoke investment management solutions tailored to the specific needs of individual trade union pension funds, benevolent funds and other general funds."

Commenting on today's 50th birthday celebrations, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber – one of the trustees of the Charitable Trust – said: "TUFM is living proof that labour and capital can work in harmony on the same side, and it allows unions to harness the forces of capitalism to work in the interests of working people.

"As profits are not ploughed back into the management of the firm, but donated to good causes, individuals and unions can invest safe in the knowledge that as well as making a good return on their investments, charities working here and abroad benefit too."

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