Posturing MPs Sign Divest Parliament Pledge

By Paul Homewood

Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell have just signed Divest Parliament pledge.

This is how the website describes the campaign:

Our political leaders call for action on climate change but their pensions remain invested in fossil fuel companies whose business model is incompatible with international agreements to tackle climate change. Divest Parliament works with MPs from across the political spectrum to call on their pension fund to halt and remove their investments in fossil fuels. By engaging with their own pension fund, MPs have the opportunity to show crucial leadership on climate change, responsible investment and the transition to a sustainable economy. We ask that the Pension Fund quantifies, reviews and discloses the fund’s investments in carbon-intensive industries, engages in a dialogue with current and former MPs and publicly commits to phasing out fossil fuel investments over an appropriate time-scale. We suggest immediately freezing any new investment in the top 200 largest fossil fuel companies, and divesting from fossil fuel public equities and corporate bonds over 5 years. If it’s wrong to wreck the planet, it’s wrong to profit from the wreckage, and our MPs have a crucial role to play in challenging the political power of an industry that continues to profit from the climate chaos it creates.

https://gofossilfree.org/uk/divest-parliament-about/

There is a supreme irony here. The MPs’ Pension Fund is guaranteed by taxpayers’ money.

MPs make a fixed contribution, but as a final salary scheme, it is the Exchequer which not only part funds the scheme, but also has to finance any shortfall.

If divesting certain assets results in destruction of asset value, or reduced income, it is the good old taxpayer who will have to stump up.

If Corbyn and his fellow posturers are serious, let them accept personal liability for any losses. Better still, if they do not like the way the scheme is run, let them simply opt out of it and make their own pension arrangements.

But there is a much more fundamental issue here, and that is the fact that the UK is still almost wholly reliant on fossil fuels.

Inland Energy Consumption – Mtoe

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/energy-trends-december-2017

Last year fossil fuels accounted for 81.5% of primary energy consumption. Furthermore, although coal consumption has fallen in recent years, the need for gas and oil has remained strong.

What on earth does this cretinous bunch of MPs think the country will do, when they have chased fossil fuel companies out of existence?