Aberdeen v Hermes: set for trial in 2028

The infrastructure fund mismanagement claim continues and has moved into disclosure and evidence phases following the first case management conference in the case.

The claim, brought by Aberdeen City Council as administering authority of the North East Scotland Pension Fund (NESPF) against the GP and Manager of Hermes Infrastructure Fund II, has reached a procedural milestone. Following the first case management conference on 16 October 2026 before Master Pester, the Court has set a trial window between 25 April and 28 July 2028, with a time estimate of 19 days.

Our March and June articles considered the claim and the parties’ respective positions. This update focuses on the timetable now set and what the directions indicate about the next phase of the dispute attracting significant attention. The directions illustrate the important role of expert evidence in the event of infrastructure fund disputes like this going to trial.

A short recap

The claim concerns the Fund’s investment in the Ventus Portfolio, comprising five Swedish onshore windfarms. NESPF alleges that the investment’s exposure to power generation risk, electricity price volatility and leverage was incompatible with its allocation to the Fund’s conservative “Core” portfolio. The Particulars of Claim identify a total investment of £104.2m and a valuation of £17m on 30 September 2025. The claimant remains an LP investor. The fund has until 2037 to run. The investment formed part of the fund’s core portfolio.

The GP and manager deny mismanagement. Their case emphasises the assessment made at the time of investment, the due diligence and modelling undertaken with expert advisers, and the market-standard nature of the baseload power purchase agreements. They attribute the subsequent outcome to unforeseen and unforeseeable market conditions, rather than deficiencies in the original investment decision.

The route to trial

The principal milestones are:

8 January 2027: the parties are to seek to agree the issues and particular questions for the experts

5 March 2027: extended disclosure / document exchange

6 August 2027: exchange of factual witness statements

1 October 2027: exchange of energy economics expert reports

26 November 2027: exchange of infrastructure investment management and quantum and valuation expert reports

21 January 2028: experts’ joint statements, following discussions with their counterparts

18 February 2028: any short supplemental expert reports, limited to areas of disagreement identified in the joint statements

The trial window is not a fixed trial start date. The order provides for a listing appointment to fix the trial and a pre-trial review approximately six weeks beforehand. The 19-day estimate includes two days of judicial pre-reading and a five-day interval between the close of evidence and oral closing submissions.

Three expert disciplines to watch

The Court has permitted expert evidence in energy economics, infrastructure investment management, and quantum and valuation, limited to one expert per party per discipline unless otherwise ordered.

Those disciplines reflect the dispute’s central questions: what risks the investment presented, how a competent infrastructure investment manager should have assessed them, and what loss, if any, is attributable to an actionable failure rather than investment underperformance. The directions reinforce the importance of testing the contemporaneous decision-making process, rather than treating the eventual outcome as an answer in itself.

What remains open?

These are case management directions; there is no comment on the merits of the respective cases and there are no findings.

The order does not record any determination of the derivative standing and limited liability issues discussed in our earlier updates. Nor should the setting of a trial timetable be read as resolving them. Our expectation had been that those issues might be resolved first. As matters stand, that does not appear to be the case. The case is not therefore following the same route as was followed in the Henderson PFI Secondary Fund II LLP proceedings in 2012 referred to in our previous articles.

For investors, GPs and managers and finance providers following the claim, the next phase is therefore principally about evidence: disclosure of the relevant documents, refinement of the questions for experts, and scrutiny of the investment assessment against the circumstances prevailing at the time.

Further updates to follow.