Divest fossil fuel company investments?

by Ray Mylius

The duty of corporations to shareholders limits their ability to avoid profitable activities and investments even when the activities funded contribute to environmental degradation. But they also need customers – and our opinions and our patronage are influential.

In the light of www.350.org and Bill McKibben’s urging divestment of fossil fuel investments I wrote to bankmecu. Bankmecu responded to the question whether the bank holds any investments in any company involved in fossil fuels, to say:

We make every endeavour to ensure our lending is economically, environmentally and socially responsible. bankmecu has not financed any fossil fuel projects and because of our responsible and customer owned approach to banking, we don’t envisage this changing anytime soon.

The bank went on to point out that it is Australia’s first customer owned responsible bank and the only Australian member of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values.

While other banks may invest in renewable energy it is probable they are also issuing loans to coal and gas projects.