The story has been updated as of Nov. 18 to reflect that the divestment team isn’t officially tied to QUFA.
Motion urging for pension divestment from companies tied to weapons manufacturing has been delayed after a scheduled meeting was postponed.
On Oct 10. the Queen’s University Faculty Association (QUFA) received a motion from the QUFA Divestment Campaign Team—a divestment team made up of various QUFA members, although not officially affiliated with QUFA in any way. The motion calls for the University Pension Plan (UPP) to divest from any company that profits from, or manufactures weapons for war.
The meeting to address the motion was set for Nov. 12, but on Nov. 3, the QUFA Divestment Campaign Team received an e-mail from QUFA that the special meeting had been postponed, with no new date for the meeting set.
The Journal reached out to the QUFA President, Karen Rudie, about the postponement of the meeting, but she declined an interview, citing that they will only be communicating with members.
The motion urges QUFA to divest from companies connected to the manufacturing or distribution of arms used in what the motion describes as “illegal occupations, and other breaches of international law in Palestine, Sudan, Myanmar, and other lands and countries.”
Although the motion is focused on broader ethical injustices, it does specifically cite recent findings by United Nations bodies and independent mortality surveys, arguing that there are reasonable grounds to believe genocide is being committed in Gaza and that investments in companies enabling such actions are incompatible with the UPP’s stated ethical investment principles. Such as the “responsibility to promote the health of capital markets and the financial, social, and environmental systems on which capital markets rely.”
In a statement to The Journal on behalf of QUFA Divestment Campaign Team, Queen’s Professor Ariel Salzmann and Librarian for Educational Initiatives Nasser Saleh wrote that the divestment team hasn’t received any updates on when the meeting will be, but QUFA has acknowledged the postponement, and “updates are expected soon.”
Salzman and Saleh also shared that the main goal of the motion is to align QUFA’s UPP with the ethical standards set by the UPP
screening process.
“The University Pension Plan (UPP) Ontario already screens its investment portfolio according to a responsible investing approach that integrates environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors into its investment decisions,” they said. “The motion’s primary goal is to align QUFA’s pension investments with these ethical standards by urging the UPP to divest from companies complicit in human rights violations.”
According to Saleh and Salzmann, the motion isn’t targeted at a specific country but rather about upholding the principle that educators shouldn’t profit from “war, crimes against humanity, violations of human rights or crimes of war” and should invest in students’ futures.
“In addition to the overwhelming documentation of Israel’s genocide in Gaza over the past two years, it’s widely known that Canadian weapons are being used to slaughter civilians in Sudan. For many faculty members, this is a matter of ethical responsibility and solidarity with global movements advocating for justice and accountability.”
Divesting from these investments, Saleh and Salzmann argue, is part of a larger movement throughout Canadian labour organizations and Canadian universities to advocate for “ethical pension governance.”
The University of Toronto Faculty Association (UTFA) is one example of this broader push to divest. On May 8, UTFA passed a motion “divestment from the manufacture of weapons used to commit or facilitate war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious violations of international law in the Occupied Palestinian Territory and elsewhere.”
A new date has yet to be set to address the motion, but if the motion is passed, Saleh and Salzmann shared that QUFA will have to reach out to UPP to enact the requests in the motion. They also shared that UPP is a jointly governed body and isn’t bound by QUFA, but the motion would still hold significant weight.
“While UPP is jointly governed and not legally bound by QUFA alone, such motions carry significant weight and influence policy discussions,” Saleh and Salzmann wrote. “UPP would likely review the request under its Investment Exclusion Policy and determine next steps, as it did with Russia-related exclusions.”
Tags
Divestment, Pension Divestment, QUFA
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Ahmed
This motion only harms Palestinians who work in Israel for higher wages than they would in Gaza and then lose their job as a result of these cultural boycotts. Any boycotts against China who is committing genocide against Muslims, or is it only against the one Jewish state? Yeah… thought so.