COUNCILS AND ETHICAL INVESTMENT

That this House notes with great concern that the Government is planning to amend the Local Government Pension Scheme Regulations 2009 to prevent local government from choosing not to invest funds in companies involved in the arms trade, illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank, tobacco industries or fossil fuels; believes that councils have not only the right, but also the duty, to avoid financially supporting companies making a profit from human misery, exploitation and death; further believes that councils must follow the wishes of local people when it comes to choosing where to invest funds; fully supports and applauds local citizens and councils who work together to create an ethical investment policy; believes that it would be shameful and outrageous for the Government to attempt to stop people from exercising their democratic right to decide where their money goes and which companies they support; further notes that Margaret Thatcher's attempts to stop councils from divesting funds away from companies which supported apartheid failed in the face of wide public support for the anti-apartheid movement; believes that, rather than trying to force people to support unethical companies against their will, the Government should seriously reconsider its own exporting rules and foreign policy and stop selling weapons to countries such as Saudi Arabia, which uses them against civilians in Yemen; and calls on the Government to stop this disgraceful attack on local democracy and start acting on the principle that public money should be used for public good.