Last Thursday we interrupted the Nottinghamshire Pension Fund Committee with a 2min speech…
All except 3 committee members walked out and the only member with voting rights on the committee who stayed was Ashfield councillor Lee Waters – who clapped at the end of our speech.
Here is the text of the speech…
We welcome the new committee members Andre Camilleri, Mike Introna, Sam Smith, Lee Waters & Jonathan Wheeler who we hope may bring new impetus to the committee.
We applaud the County Council’s declaration of a Climate Emergency and the commitment to achieve carbon neutrality in all its activities by 2030.
We noted that the leader of the County Council Ben Bradley specifically identified council investments and Pensions as part of the carbon neutrality target.
This new positive direction of the County Council creates an exciting opportunity to boost the local economy and create thousands of sustainable jobs whilst at the same time helping to save future generations from a miserable uncertain future.
We strongly believe that the people of Nottinghamshire and the pension fund members would support a shift from the immoral funding of the very industries that have knowingly caused this crisis to the creation of a strong local economy that will help mitigate against its worst consequences.
We believe this is the stated intent of the new leader of the Council so we are particularly disappointed at the postponement of the report and discussion on “financial investments in relation to climate risk” This demonstrates a lack of urgency once again when asked to face up to the reality of pension investments.
This now appears to be completely at odds with stated County Council policy.
An emergency clearly requires urgent action
It is your duty and responsibility to all pension fund holders and on behalf of the people of Nottinghamshire and future generations to act with integrity and honour the commitments that you have made to Carbon neutrality.
History will bear witness as to whether you make the right choices or continue to find reasons for not acting now with all due urgency.
Thank you for your time.
