The Greater Manchester campaign
for fossil fuel divestment

Fossil Free Greater Manchester

Latest news:

  • Join us as the GM Pension Fund meeting next Friday 8 March in Droylsden
    A very big thank you to everyone who supported our action outside the Greater Manchester Combined Authority meeting on 23 February. It was not the best weather and last minute venue changes derailed our plans a little, but the elephant persisted and so did we. The GMCA know we are not going away until they…

About us

We are part of a rapidly growing global alliance campaigning for divestment. Weā€™re working with trade unions, scheme members and others to persuade the Greater Manchester Pension Fund to ditch its risky and polluting investments in fossil fuel companies.

In response to the climate emergency, we’re calling on the Greater Manchester Pension Fund to:

  1. Make the fund fossil free within the next 2 years.
  2. Immediately move all investments out of the most polluting fossil fuels (coal, tar sands & fracking).
  3. Develop a strategy to invest in local climate solutions in Greater Manchester.

Wildfires, droughts, floods, hurricanes, extreme heat … the GMPF is funding climate chaos.

  • Over Ā£1.6 billion is currently invested in polluting fossil fuel companies such as Shell & BP.
  • These companies are risky investments for our planet and our pockets.
  • GMPF should take urgent action on the climate emergency – net zero by 2050 is too late.

See our About page for more information.

Sign-up as a supporter

Get involved by joining one of our actions, writing letters or speaking to your councillor. For more ideas, take a look at ourĀ Ā “get involved” page. If you’d like to receive emails about what we’ve been doing and what we’ve got planned, subscribe to our mailing list by filling inĀ this form.

Write to your councillor

Ask your GM councillors to raise this issue in their council and with GMPF. Here’s a template letter (pdf and Word versions) to your councillors that you can modify as you wish. (If one of your councillors is the council leader you’ll need to revise the letter, as it suggests that councillors write to their leader.)

Find your councillors here (you will have three) or by going to your council’s website and looking them up. Most councillors have weekly surgeries where you can meet them. Challenge them about GMPF if you know they’ve made claims about GM’s environmental credibility.

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What is divestment?

Over 80% of the worldā€™s coal, oil and gas reserves are unburnable if we want to halt climate change.

The hundreds of billions of pounds invested in energy projects every year need to be moved out of the fossil fuel industry and invested in clean energy instead.

Universities, pension funds, churches and other institutions are increasingly taking their investments out of coal, oil and gas.

Weā€™ve joined this rapidly growing global alliance, and are campaigning to persuade the Greater Manchester Pension Fund (GMPF) to divest the Ā£1 billion it has invested in fossil fuels.

Why divest?

The Greater Manchester Pension Fund (GMPF) is the largest and dirtiest in the  country. By following in the footsteps of hundreds of investors, from Norway to New York to Cardiff, the GMPF must divest to…

  • Do the right thing
    for a safe future for members, their families and families around the world
  • Reduce financial risk
    secure our pensions as fossil fuels are phased out.
  • Protect our reputation
    live up to Greater Manchesterā€™s zero-carbon ambition.
  • Invest in the future
    support clean renewable energy, not the fossil fuel dinosaurs of the past.

Join us

If you’d like to join the campaign, why not come along to one of our meetings?  We meet on Zoom the second and fourth Monday of the month. All welcome. Please email us on fossilfreegm@gmail.com to let us know you’d like to join our meetings and we’ll send you a Zoom link.

Latest Articles

Join us as the GM Pension Fund meeting next Friday 8 March in Droylsden

3rd March 2024

A very big thank you to everyone who supported our action outside the Greater Manchester Combined Authority meeting on 23 February. It was not the best weather and last minute venue changes derailed our plans a little, but the elephant persisted and so did we. The GMCA know we are not going away until they…

Read more

West Yorkshire Pension Fund announces review of its fossil fuel investments

Great news! After years of campaigning by Fossil Free West Yorkshire, the West Yorkshire Pension Fund (WYPF) has just announced that it will: Not use WYPF assets to fund new fossil fuel developments. In particular WYPF will not be lending to the oil, gas and coal sector. Review its level of holdings in the oil…

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Call out the elephant in the room!

28th January 2024

Join us in Manchester – 23 February After a string of great actions in 2023, we’re keeping up the pressure on the GM Pension Fund, Mayor and Council Leaders to act on the climate crisis and take public money out of fossil fuels. The ten Greater Manchester Council Leaders and the Mayor will be meeting…

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We doused global heating flames in Droylsden

8th December 2023

Thanks to everyone who joined us outside the Greater Manchester Pension Fund’s HQ in Droylsden on 1st December for the Pension Fund’s Management and Advisory Panel meeting. Despite the freezing weather we had a great turnout, with representatives from several GM Unison branches. Two of Unison’s representatives on the Fund’s Advisory Panel joined us on…

Read more