City Council will debate divestment on Monday – Your help is urgently needed!
Date/Time
Date(s) - 13 Oct 2025
3:30 PM - 4:30 PM
| The City Council is about to debate a proposal to divest from companies complicit in Israel’s genocide.
If it is adopted, it will be a major achievement for the BDS movement, and for the local solidarity movement. It will distance our local council from the Starmer government, and send a powerful message to the Israeli regime. There are several ways you can help to influence the decision. Please take action now! |
 |
Background
On Monday 13th October, Brighton & Hove City Council will be asked to approve an important proposal, put forward by the Green Party. It will commit the Council to removing its exposure to a wide range of companies that enable Israel to carry out its ongoing genocide in Gaza, and maintain its apartheid regime. If adopted, the proposal would clearly demonstrate the Council’s opposition to the genocide. And the amount of money in question is considerable.
You can find the text of the motion here.
The Council leader, Bella Sankey, has indicated in a recent article in The Argus that she has already taken one of the steps that is being proposed: she has written to the Chair of the Pension Committee at East Sussex County Council, demanding that he explain what action his Committee plans to take to divest the hundreds of millions of pounds currently invested in complicit companies. The City Council is in a strong position to demand this, as a major partner in the County Council’s pension scheme. So, the momentum is already in our favour.
The City Council is more likely to endorse this proposal if they can see that it commands widespread local support. So, it’s essential that BHPSC members get involved in the campaign in the run-up to the Council vote on Monday 13th October.
Here are actions you can take:
1. Write to your own ward councillors
If you live within Brighton & Hove, you will have two or three city councillors for your own ward. Please write to them, urging them to vote in favour of the motion. This must be done immediately, as the meeting is Monday afternoon.
There is a template letter at the end of this announcement that you can adapt, so it shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.
You can find the names and contact details of your ward councillors here:
https://democracy.brighton-hove.gov.uk/mgFindMember.aspx
2. Join the rally outside Hove Town Hall at 3.30pm on the day of the meeting, Monday 13 October 2025
See the graphic at the top of this notice. This is to show councillors arriving for the meeting what the strength of local feeling is.
This vote is crucial. We can all make a difference.
Template letter to email to your city councillors:
Dear Cllr
I am writing as one of your ward constituents to urge you to vote in favour of the Notice of Motion on the agenda for the full Council meeting on Monday 13 October. The motion (‘Gaza and Council Financial Exposure’) would require the Council to meet its legal obligations to ensure their activities do not contribute to violations of international law. These obligations are set out in a recently-published legal position paper cited in the text of the Notice of Motion. In the context of an appalling genocide currently being perpetrated on the Palestinian population of Gaza, now entering its third year, there is a great need for speedy and decisive action.
The Council’s portfolio must now as a matter of urgency be scrutinised to identify complicit investments, and then move swiftly to divest from those investments. At the same time, the Council must now as a matter of urgency demand that the East Sussex Pension Scheme, of which BHCC is a major partner, moves swiftly to divest from complicit investments. Research by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign shows that the ESPS holds some £170 million in complicit investments. They now have a legal, as well as a moral, obligation to divest from those investments.
I note that Cllr Sankey has recently written to the Chair of the ESCC Pension Committee to signal the Council’s frustration over the Scheme’s heavy exposure to complicit companies. This is a welcome start, but I urge you to add your own voice to that of Cllr Sankey’s by voting in favour of the Notice of Motion on Monday.
Thank you