A DELEGATION of Christian Aid supporters from Tavistock visited the town’s HSBC branch on Monday (April 1) to urge the bank to stop financing climate-wrecking fossil fuels.

The visit was part of a national action by Christian Aid supporter to visit branches across the country, calling on the global bank to ensure its activity is in keeping with the Paris Agreement’s target of keeping the global warming rise within 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial temperatures.

The campaigners delivered a letter to the branch staff to forward to HSBC chief executive John Flint, urging the bank to invest in clean energy and help protect the world and its people.

They also called on the bank to phase out financing fossil fuels altogether and to remove Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia from an exception to a bar on financing new coal-powered plants across the world.

The Rev Rob Weston, from Tavistock United Reformed Church, said: ‘These are exceptional times. We’ve sat back and expected other people to tackle climate change for too long.

‘Christian Aid’s Lent and Easter appeal is called Rise Up and as the waters rise around the world, we have to rise up and speak for all those people whose livelihoods are being destroyed by climate change.

‘Leading scientists and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change tell us we have 12 years to stop catastrophic climate change.

‘We have to do everything we can to make sure that those financing dirty fossil fuels are held to account.

‘SBC has agreed to invest $100-billion in tackling climate change by 2025.

‘This is fantastic. But it’s still investing in fossil fuels, which are fuelling climate change and destroying lives. We want HSBC to use its position as a major bank to lead the way and close the gap between its rhetoric and its actions.

‘People in Tavistock value having banks in the town centre and we’d like to thank the staff at the bank who agreed to pass the letter on.

‘Change happens when people come together and it’s great to know that we’re part of a national movement from Cornwall to Aberdeen.’

Christian Aid works in 37 countries and its partner organisations across the globe are already experiencing the devastating effects of climate change, which hits the poorest communities first and worst.