As school summer holidays kick off around the UK, those visiting National Trust sites may come across campaigners demanding the charity stop banking with Barclays due to its ties with the fossil fuel industry.
Led by National Trust staff, volunteers and members, a week of protests commences today (29 July), and will target 40 locations including the family home of Winston Churchill in Kent, Corfe Castle in Bournemouth, Ham House in West London and the spot where the Magna Carta was signed at Runnymede.
Sally Chapman, a volunteer at National Trust property Knightshayes in Devon, says: “It is nice to give something back after all these years of visiting, but I am really unhappy about the National Trust banking with Barclays and I am sure that National Trust founder, Octavia Hill, would be too. It does not fit with her vision of providing healthy green spaces for ordinary people.”
Barclays is the biggest funder of fossil fuels in Europe. According to the Banking on Climate Chaos report, last year the bank provided over $24 billion in financing to fossil fuel companies, and has provided a total of over $235 billion since 2016. In the last 18 months other organisations that have dropped the bank due to its poor climate record include Christian Aid, Oxfam and Sheffield Cathedral.
The protests will take different forms at each site. A parade will take place at the Longshaw Estate in the Peak District, while a punting protest will wend through Bathampton Meadows in Bath. Other groups are creating music with drummers and singers and holding protest picnics.
A National Trust employee who works at a countryside property in Yorkshire, but didn’t want to be named, says: “The National Trust does so much great conservation work to mitigate the effects of climate change for habitats and species. It’s a real shame that is counteracted by continuing to bank with Barclays, a bank that funds fossil fuel expansion.”
This isn’t the first time the National Trust has come under fire for its choice of bank. Last year, Dominic Acland, whose grandfather presented the family’s 17,000-acre ancestral estate to the Trust in 1944, told the Financial Times that his grandfather would be “horrified that the National Trust is banking with Barclays”, due to its links to fossil fuels.
A spokesperson for the National Trust said they were aware of the strong feeling on this issue from members: “The National Trust fully understands the urgency needed to find solutions to the climate crisis and the strength of feeling about this among some of our supporters.
“We welcomed Barclays’ announcement that they will stop direct financing to clients engaged in oil and gas expansion, and that they will require their clients in the energy sector to prepare climate transition plans. It is critically important that we continue to engage with the banking sector to do more and faster to reduce financed emissions.”
