Celebrities call on UK banks to stop financing new oil, gas and coal fields | Climate crisis

A host of famous names, including Stephen Fry, Emma Thompson and Mark Rylance, have joined activists and businesses in urging Britain’s Big Five banks to stop funding new oil, gas and coal expansions.

Make My Money Matter, a campaign created by Comic Relief writer, director and co-founder Richard Curtis, has written to the chief executives of HSBC, Barclays, Santander, NatWest and Lloyds to urge these banks to “stop financing fossil fuel expansion”.

Curtis said they wanted to raise public awareness of “the dangerous relationship between UK banks and the fossil fuel industry”.

The public is invited to join celebrities, politicians, activists and business leaders by signing the open letter.

The call comes days after research showed banks and financial institutions committed to net-zero pledges are still investing heavily in fossil fuels.

Make My Money Matter referred to a February 2022 report by campaign group ShareAction, which claimed that HSBC, Barclays, Santander, NatWest and Lloyds together raised nearly $16bn (£12.9bn) in funding in 2021 for the 50 largest oil companies would have provided and gas companies expanding production.

Curtis’ group said this was “despite clear guidance from the International Energy Agency that we cannot develop new oil and gas fields if we want to limit global warming to below 1.5 degrees”.

The ShareAction report also found that the UK’s five banks funded the top 50 oil and gas expanders for a total of $141bn (£114bn) between 2016 and 2021.

And this despite polls pointing to growing public demand for banks to respond to the climate crisis.

Almost a third (29%) of HSBC, Barclays, Santander, NatWest and Lloyds customers surveyed by Make My Money Matter said they would switch banks if they found it funding fossil fuel expansion. Meanwhile, 86% felt their bank was not doing enough to tackle the climate catastrophe.

In addition to Fry, Thompson and Rylance, high-profile signatories included musician Brian Eno, naturalist and presenter Chris Packham and Green MP Caroline Lucas. Corporate, activist and charitable signatories included Just Stop Oil, Greenpeace UK, Save the Children UK, Ecotricity, Ella’s Kitchen and Triodos Bank.

The signatories pledge not only to advocate for change, but also to switch to banks that do not finance the expansion of fossil fuels.

Curtis said, “We hope this weird and wonderful coalition of activists and actors, corporations and brands, celebrities and climate champions will light a fire among the banks to stop them from setting the world on fire.”

In recent months, some UK banks have taken steps to limit financing for fossil fuel expansion.

The most important stories of the planet. Get all the environmental news of the week – the good, the bad and the big ones

Data protection: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertisements and content sponsored by third parties. You can find more information in our data protection declaration. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

HSBC said it announced restrictions on oil and gas financing last month, and the bank said Make My Money Matter was quoted in a ` News report that appeared to welcome the policy.

A spokesman for HSBC said: “HSBC aims to reduce emissions in line with a 1.5°C path to net-zero while promoting energy security, affordability and access. Our 1.5°C focused financed emissions targets and updated energy policy mean that we will no longer provide new financing or advisory services for new oil and gas fields or associated infrastructure, or for the most carbon-intensive oil assets.

“Supporting customers in high-emission sectors to decarbonize will have the greatest impact on emissions reductions in the real economy and accelerate an orderly transition to net-zero.”

Lloyds announced in October that it would not support direct financing to develop new oil and gas fields. It updated its climate policy to make the change.

A NatWest spokesman said: “We no longer lend or underwrite coal, oil and gas producers unless they have a credible transition plan in line with the Paris Agreement, which has resulted in our committing to almost 1 £1 billion to phase out fossil fuels Fuel finance. Our lending to the oil and gas sector has decreased significantly…with exposure to this sector now accounting for less than 1% of our total lending.”

Barclays said it was one of the first banks to set an “ambition” to become net zero by 2050. A spokesman said: “Many oil and gas companies are actively and critically engaged in the transition and are committing significant resources and expertise to renewable energy. We believe we can make the greatest difference by helping these customers transition to a low-carbon economy and facilitating the financing needed to transform their business practices and scale green technologies. Where carbon-intensive companies are unable or unwilling to reduce or eliminate their emissions, we will scale back our support over time.”

A Santander spokesman said: “We are fully committed to supporting the transition to net zero and have set emission reduction targets for 2030 across a range of material emitting sectors in our loan portfolio, including power generation, thermal coal and energy ( Oil and gas). Our lending policies prohibit, among other things, the financing of new upstream oil customers and projects, and for the past 10 years we have consistently been one of the largest providers of renewable energy project finance in the world.”