Majority of Hackney Unison’s council pension holders support ethical divestment, survey finds

Divestment protesters camped outside Hackney Town Hall from April until July. Photograph: Hackney Citizen

The majority of council pension holders at the Town Hall’s largest union support ethical divestment, a survey has found.

Hackney Unison asked its members who are part of the Local Government Pension Scheme, both still in work or retired, for their views.

Ninety per cent of the 274 respondents said they do not want their pensions invested in arms or weapons manufacturers.

Eighty-five per cent were also against investments in companies that profit from human rights abuses.

The union said it launched the survey “as workers grew increasingly alarmed by the council’s position on the £22.5 million invested through pension funds in Occupied Palestinian Territories”.

One of these investments is in Elbit, an Israeli arms company, and pressure has grown on the council to divest this since the Israel-Hamas war broke out on 7 October last year.

Mayor of Hackney Caroline Woodley and chief executive Dawn Carter-McDonald have previously expressed support for “ethical divestment”.

However, pensions committee chair Cllr Kam Adams rejected calls for any divestment at a meeting last week.

Matt Paul, branch secretary of Hackney Unison, said in response: “Kam Adams says that fiduciary duty means to get the best possible return, but that’s incorrect; it means making the best decisions in the interest of members.

“How do they know what the interests of members are if they’ve never asked us? I’ve been a pension scheme member for over 11 years, and they’ve never consulted us on where we want our money invested.”

He continued: “It’s not their money, it’s ours. We should have a say in these things.”

The Unison survey also found that 95 per cent of respondents want to be regularly consulted on where their pension funds are invested.

Eighty-five per cent agreed that a trade union representative is needed on the pensions committee to provide better worker representation.

In response to the survey, a Hackney Council spokesperson said: “The council supports the trade union movement and regularly meets and engages with trade union colleagues. We will consider any representation a trade union wishes to make as we would usually.

“Alongside this and as set out during the pensions committee meeting, the fund is currently developing a survey for all scheme members and employers in the pension fund, seeking their views on a number of responsible investment issues.

“The results of this will be used to help inform the future development of the fund’s responsible investment policy.

“We expect that the survey will be reviewed at the September meeting of the pensions committee and circulated to all members and employers in October.”

Update: this article was amended at 6.45pm on 23 July 2024. The original story stated that the majority of council staff were in favour of ethical divestment, but this was not an accurate interpretation of a survey of union members, some of whom are now retired. We apologise for the inaccuracy.