Britain will launch Cop26 in Glasgow while taxpayers are still funding fossil fuels – CityAM : CityAM

On Monday, the parliamentary committee for International Development  demanded the government stop investing in the fossil fuel sector, including through its private-sector arm, the CDC Group.

CDC is investing hundreds of millions of precious aid money in fossil fuel companies that compound the climate crisis. Propping up the fossil fuel industry will inevitably mean more climate finance will be needed, particularly for adaptation. If aid is wasted on fossil fuels it also means less is available for crucial spending on interventions that tackle famine, bolster women’s rights or provide vital healthcare to those who need it most.

This government shouldn’t allow CDC to continue to hold investments in coal, oil and gas companies, locking millions of people in low-income countries to polluting technologies, under the guise of poverty alleviation. Instead, it should respond to the British public’s growing concern over climate change.

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As a co-founder of the Powering Past Coal Alliance and a supposed credible climate leader, it is unfathomable that the UK still has millions of pounds invested in fossil fuel projects, such as coal mines in India and gas terminals in Bangladesh, to name but a few. It’s these same countries that are regularly experiencing devastating heatwaves, droughts and floods as a result of climate change. As Cop26 president and one of the biggest historic polluters, the UK must be one of the first to end its support of fossil fuels and support countries overseas to rapidly transition to renewable energy.

Now, is the perfect opportunity for the government to clean up the CDC and get it out of dirty energy once and for all. At the moment the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office is looking to give CDC billions of pounds of taxpayers money, on top of the £3.5bn it has already given over the last few years.

If we are to really get a grip on tackling the climate crisis, the government must instruct CDC to focus on direct investments in companies that are committed to creating quality green jobs in renewable energy, low carbon transport and sustainable agriculture. The CDC can and should lead the way in showing industries that a just transition to a green economy is the only way forward, for workers and financiers.

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This, afterall, is the epitome of encouraging private sector investors to tackle climate change – a cornerstone of the government’s plans.

It isn’t just charities on their soapboxes demanding this. This is what investors want too, and not just the ones who have ESG in their job title. The CDC’s work is meant to be additional and to encourage investors to go to countries in Africa and South Asia they might not feel comfortable considering. So, what better way to be part of the growing momentum in the financial sector for impact investing and green bonds than for the CDC to take the lead and use its patient capital to de-risk and catalyze nascent green markets in countries in the Global south.

The committee was clear in their recommendations: the UK government must tell the CDC to begin looking at divesting from all existing coal, gas and oil investments by October 2022 to free up funds to support developing countries in their transition to a low-carbon economy.

People are dying from the effects of the climate crisis.

The government has a moral obligation to do right by us all, stop flushing our money down the drain and end its contributions to rising global temperatures for good.