Climate Justice UBC representatives and other UBC students gathered outside the Nest to raise awareness of RBC’s investment into fossil fuels and boycott the bank’s support of the Coastal GasLink Pipeline on Thursday, March 2.
RBC is Canada’s largest fossil fuel giant and is financially supporting the Coastal GasLink Pipeline (CGL), which is impeding on Wet’suwet’en territory.
Climate Justice UBC (CJUBC) representatives voiced their disapproval of RBCs lack of action regarding the divestment of its projects at Thursday’s rally — which lasted for about an hour.
Savini Goel, a CJUBC Representative, said the protest comes a month before RBC’s annual general meeting. Goel said this is one of their last efforts to call for action against the bank.
“RBC funds this pipeline and it’s our last chance to really have RBC divest from this project, because it’s displacing Indigenous people from their land, their culture and also pushing us towards a climate disaster.”
Throughout the protest, attendees shouted “RBC Off Campus,” a play on the name of the bank's on-campus branch.
CJUBC's goal is to drive out RBC from the Nest, and replace it with a local banking system credit union such as Vancity.
“We really want the AMS to kick out RBC from the Nest to move towards more fossil-free financing because currently with [this] system all of the clubs — which are part of the AMS — they have to use an RBC credit card,” Goel said. The AMS uses RBC services for financial operations and club finances.
In early April, two UBC students chained and glued themselves to the RBC branch in the Nest, as part of the Glue Yourself to an RBC movement. Then AMS President Cole Evans wrote in an email to The Ubyssey at the time of the demonstration that the society couldn’t alter its financial relationship with RBC due to “long-term loan agreements and much-needed financial infrastructure.”
The AMS did not renew its eHub contract with RBC in June 2022, however.
“One way you can kind of help fight for a better future and climate is looking into typically smaller credit unions like Vancity, which have a lot of initiatives, which are better for the climate,” said Vedin Schimmack, adding that these credit unions also work on affordable housing.
CJUBC hopes to gain media coverage on the events surrounding RBC’s plans regarding fossil fuel and CGL funding, and to spread this information nationwide.
“This is a protest happening across 12 different universities. So we want to get enough attention for RBC to hopefully get the message that we want them to divest from the Coastal Gas[Link] pipeline project, like now,” said Goel.
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