UNISON NORTH WEST CLIMATE EMERGENCY GROUP:

Many of us within UNISON are deeply concerned by the continuing investment in fossil fuels from Greater Manchester Pension Fund, in which many of us have our pensions invested.

Currently they speak of reaching Net Zero by 2050 but this is not even in line with GM Combined Authority target of 2030.

Around £1.8billion is currently invested in fossil fuel companies such as Shell and BP. They are funding climate chaos – moorland fires, toxic air and extreme weather – and these are risky investments. Local governments have a responsibility to work for the public good.

Sooner or later governments will have to call time on these industries and GMPF will end up with stranded assets – putting  its members’ pensions at risk.

We have created a petition requesting that GMPF divest within 2 years and put its money into scaling up low carbon industries instead, to enable a Green and Just Transition.

Unison North West Climate Emergency Group (UNWCEG) are backing this petition, which has been set up by members  in the Salford Branch. They are looking at petitioning for divestment from fossil fuels in all  pension funds , although no fund is as great an offender as GMPF.

Here’s the link, it will be brilliant to have your support on this. Please sign and share.

https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/protect-our-planet-protect-your-pension

Thanks for your support.

Mary Clarke , Gale Blackburn , Jason Hunter.

Unison North West Climate Emergency Group

For further reading, here is UNISON's Responsible Investment in LGPS report.

To join the UNISON NW Climate Emergency Group, please email Jason Hunter: [email protected]