A FORMER SNP minister is among a cross-party group of politicians calling on the Scottish Government and Parliament to end investment in fossil fuel companies. Marco Biagi has joined former Labour leader Jackie Baillie and Scottish Greens co-convenor Patrick Harvey to make the demand ahead of discussions tomorrow over the Scottish Parliament pension fund. The fund currently has no ethical policy and invests more than £1 million in oil, gas and coal companies – despite Parliament pledges to tackle climate change. A total of 15 MSPs and former MSPs have signed up to the Divest Scotland Campaign which is supported by Friends of the Earth Scotland (FoES). “Pensions need to be funded through safe, long-term investments but I won’t be collecting mine until a decade after Scotland aims to be carbon neutral,” said Biagi, former local government minister.
The National 3rd June 2019 read more »
Pension schemes should be supported for moving people’s money out of fossil fuels and into renewables because the financial risks from the climate crisis are “too important to ignore”, a government minister will say on Monday. The pensions minister, Guy Opperman, is due to tell a conference that pension and investment managers must “do the right thing” and take their environmental and social responsibilities seriously to help combat the climate emergency. During the last few years a number of pension schemes have taken action to protect their members from the risks associated with climate change by reducing their exposure to companies with reserves of coal, oil and gas. Some have pulled all of their funds out of these companies, while others have chosen to apply a positive “tilt” that increases support for businesses identified as vital to combating the climate crisis, such as those working on renewable energy, while at the same time reducing investment in firms that are heavy carbon emitters, have fossil fuel reserves or are not making the sorts of changes needed to meet emission reduction targets. In April, the Guardian revealed that parliament’s pension fund trustees were to reconsider the rules of their investments to take account of the risks posed by the climate emergency.
Guardian 3rd June 2019 read more »