Issue - meetings

Motion

Meeting: 26/01/2022 - Council (Item 83)

A period of up to one hour is allocated to consider the motions on notice. This may only be extended with the agreement of the Council.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Chairman opened this item by explaining that four Motions on Notice had been submitted for consideration at this meeting of Council. However, Councillor S. Robinson, who had submitted one of these Motions, had agreed that her Motion could be referred on for consideration at the following meeting of the Constitution Review Working Group and it would not therefore be debated at Council. There were therefore three Motions for debate at the meeting.

Ethical Banking

Members considered the following Motion on Notice submitted by Councillor H. Rone-Clarke:

“Ethical banking – divesting from the big polluters

In doing business with banks such as Lloyds, who are profiting from climate breakdown, Bromsgrove District Council is itself having a negative impact on our environment, as well as failing to ‘walk the walk’ on climate change. This hurts our credibility when we call upon residents to make necessary changes to their own lifestyles in order to lessen their carbon footprint.

Therefore, Council resolves to divest from the offending banks in favour of institutions with an ethical policy that refrains from investing in fossil fuel firms.”

The Motion was proposed by Councillor H. Rone-Clarke and seconded by Councillor P. McDonald.

In proposing the Motion, Councillor Rone-Clarke explained that it was calling for the Council to divest from financial institutions that profited from climate change. The Council used Lloyds Bank, and for this reason it had been referenced in the wording of the Motion. However, there were other banking options available to the local authority, including banks that did not invest in fossil fuels, such as The Co-operative Bank and The Unity Trust Bank.

Councillor Rone-Clarke commented that a number of Councillors had taken a decision to stand back from the Climate Change Working Group, which might have tackled this subject. However, many of the Councillors who had decided not to participate in the work of that group were meeting privately to discuss climate change matters. The action proposed in the Motion was one that could be taken by the Council to address climate change.

In seconding the Motion, Councillor McDonald reminded Members that the Council had declared a climate emergency some years previously. Action to tackle climate change was also considered to be a priority at both the local and national level and there was more that could be done to address this. The Council could exert influence by banking with an institution that did not invest in fossil fuels. Councillor McDonald also commented that the Council could have a greater impact on tackling climate change if a Climate Change Strategy was developed for the authority.

The Leader responded to the Motion by commenting that banking facilities were of tremendous importance to a local authority. Credible banking suppliers which were in practice available to the Council, given the broad level of service required and level of creditworthiness required, were quite limited. In 2020, the Group Sustainable Business Director of Lloyds Bank PLC had stated that they were delighted to be the highest-ranking UK bank and ... view the full minutes text for item 83