This evening, on May the 1st 2024, YUSU President Pierrick Roger announced on Instagram that ”the University of York will become the first English University to stop investments in fossil fuels, fossil fuel banking, arms companies, and violators of international law simultaneously.”
On the 17th of April, the University of York published its new responsible investment commitments on their website. The website claims “in 2024 the University confirmed it holds no investment in companies that primarily make or sell weapons and defence-related products or services.” These commitments prohibit the University from investing in any company whose primary activity is:
- Oil/gas
- Tobacco
- Thermal coal
- Shale oil/gas
- Cluster bombs and landmines
- Armaments and defence
- Gambling
- Predatory lending
These new commitments build on the University’s earlier decision to stop investing in fossil fuel companies in 2019.
Pierrick Roger, YUSU President and previous Environment and Ethics Officer, has been lobbying for this change for the past three years. He states, “This issue is so important to our students. The University has not only listened, but has constructively involved us to ensure their new approach addresses our concerns.”
Roger was the lead author of the “Money Doesn’t Grow on Trees” report. This report showed where the University of York’s investments and funding were coming from. When this report was made publicly accessible to students it raised many concerns regarding the ethics of the University.
This afternoon, Roger made the following Instagram post:
Divestment is also a key aspect of many of the pro-Palestine protests and encampments happening on university campuses across the USA and the UK this week, with many students calling for their schools to cut ties with the arms trade.
The Palestine Society (PalSoc) has also shared their support for the divestment process, saying ‘after prolonged protests, rallies, marches and direct action by students, the University of York has been forced to complete the full divestment from weapons and arms manufacturers’. The University of York Palestinian Solidarity placed pressure on the university to divest this year, organising walkouts, disrupting a careers fair which hosted arms traders, sending an open letter, and running various educational-awareness events. The communal effort to pressure the university to divest is part of an ongoing call from the group stating, “as students we say no more: no more university complicity in genocide, no more funding for apartheid and no more investment in settler colonialism.”
Professor Charlie Jeffery, Vice-Chancellor of the University of York, has publicly commented on the move, writing, ‘I’m very proud York has evolved our investment strategy in this way, in line with our values as a University for public good.”
“Our students in particular have raised their concerns about responsible investment and corporate links to armaments and defence, and they have rightly and passionately challenged us to rethink our approach.”