Special 'DIVEST!' film screening at Lewes Depot cinema

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Ground-breaking film documents launch of the fastest-growing divestment movement in world history

The Depot cinema in Lewes will be holding a special screening of 350.org's film 'DIVEST! The Climate Movement on Tour' on Monday 27 January, together with several short films produced by Divest East Sussex.

The screening will take place at 6pm. Tickets can be purchased at the The Depot website: https://lewesdepot.org

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Featuring Naomi Klein, Desmond Tutu, Bill McKibben and others, 'DIVEST!' chronicles US climate group 350.org's 2012 tour across the US as it launched the fossil fuel divestment campaign onto the US and ultimately international stage. Launched in 2013, Divest East Sussex is the local part of this global movement.

Members of the public wearing masks of East Sussex Pension Fund decision-makers Councillors Fox, Hollidge and Redstone hold a ‘See no climate crisis, Hear no climate crisis, Speak no climate crisis’ protest outside County Hall, 25 September 2024.Members of the public wearing masks of East Sussex Pension Fund decision-makers Councillors Fox, Hollidge and Redstone hold a ‘See no climate crisis, Hear no climate crisis, Speak no climate crisis’ protest outside County Hall, 25 September 2024.
Members of the public wearing masks of East Sussex Pension Fund decision-makers Councillors Fox, Hollidge and Redstone hold a ‘See no climate crisis, Hear no climate crisis, Speak no climate crisis’ protest outside County Hall, 25 September 2024.

On a nightly basis the 2012 tour laid out the moral and historial for fossil fuel divestment, drawing on the findings of Bill McKibben's 2012 Rolling Stone Article 'Global Warming's Terrifying New Math'.

Since then, over 1600 institutions representing over $40 trillion in assets have made some form of commitment to stop investing in ('divest') from fossil fuel companies.

Divestment campaigns aim to effect real-world change through a process of social stigmatisation, driving restrictive legislation on the company or companies – a strategy with a proven track-record of success. Indeed. a 2013 Oxford University report concluded that: ‘In almost every divestment campaign we reviewed from adult services to Darfur, from tobacco to South Africa, divestment campaigns were successful in lobbying for restrictive legislation affecting stigmatised firms.’

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The 27 January screening will also feature four short films from Divest East Sussex, including 'Hope in the henhouse' (a special song about East Sussex Pension Committee chair Gerard Fox, composed during the 2020 lockdown) and 'This is a climate crime scene!' (a one minute film about 2021 encirclement of County Hall in 'climate crime scene tape').

Hip Hop Caucus president Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jnr in a still from the DIVEST! film.Hip Hop Caucus president Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jnr in a still from the DIVEST! film.
Hip Hop Caucus president Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jnr in a still from the DIVEST! film.

Divest East Sussex has now been campaigning for over eleven years to get East Sussex County Council and the East Sussex Pension Fund to stop investing in fossil fuel companies like Shell and BP.

The East Sussex Pension Fund, which covers Brighton & Hove as well as East Sussex but is administered by East Sussex County Council (ESCC), has consistently refused to stop investing in fossil fuels (oil, coal and gas). It currently has millions of pounds of local people’s pension monies invested in oil and gas companies like Shell and BP.

Lewes Town and District Councils have both passed motions in support of divesting the East Sussex Pension Fund from fossil fuels.

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The screening on 27 January will be followed by a Q&A with East Sussex Pension Fund member Sarah Hazlehurst and University of Sussex professor and co-founder of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty initiative Peter Newell. The discussion will be facilitated by Juliet Oxborrow from the Lewes Climate Hub.

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