Tell East Riding Council to Stop Investing in Fossil Fuels!

Tell East Riding Council to Stop Investing in Fossil Fuels!

Started
14 October 2022
Signatures: 413Next Goal: 500
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Why this petition matters

Started by angela harley

David Attenborough says: "It is crazy that our banks and our pensions are investing in fossil fuels when these are the very things that are jeopardising the future that we are saving for " (1)

Unbelievably, East Riding of Yorkshire Council's Pension Fund still invests more than £120 million in oil and gas companies (2) directly linked to the unprecedented and extreme weather events we are seeing in Yorkshire and across the world.

Despite the 40-degree heat, wildfires, floods, rising sea levels and killer air pollution, Shell (one of the companies the Council invests in) is still exploring for new oil and gas fields (3). Although they try to fool us with their greenwashing advertisements, they actually invest 3 times more money in oil and gas than they do in low carbon projects (4). The Council invests in many other European, Russian, Chinese and Saudi Arabian companies who are behaving in exactly the same way.

East Riding Council may have declared a climate emergency in 2021, but their Climate Change Strategy does not even mention the huge carbon footprint of the pension fund! Yet depriving the oil and gas industry of investment is one of the most powerful things we can do (5) and sends the message that there is no social licence for these polluting industries.

Please help us send a message to East Riding Council that they must stop financing floods, fires and air pollution:

We, the undersigned call on the East Riding of Yorkshire Council's Pension Fund Committee to request its fund managers withdraw investments from any "energy" company still actively involved in the exploration for, or production and processing of, fossil fuels. 

references:

1.https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=3171509193076114

2.Freedom of Information request data March 2021

3.Shell major projects

4.https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/sep/15/could-wael-sawan-usher-in-a-renewable-revolution-at-shell

5.https://makemymoneymatter.co.uk/21x/ 

Photo of Skipsea with kind permission of Ashley Cooper

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Signatures: 413Next Goal: 500
Support now
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