Students shunning insurance companies with fossil fuel ties say their open letter is just the first step 

_{Photo Credits: Denise Baker}

Students who sent an open letter to insurance companies saying they wouldn’t work for firms insuring controversial fossil fuel projects are asking to meet executives from Lloyds of London to discuss the demands in their letter. 

“We think it’s very important for them to meet us and listen to what we have to say, because we are the people they want to recruit,” said the initiator of the letter, Sacha Ruello, a 21-year-old French student at University College London (UCL). 

The group of students and recent graduates from leading UK universities, shunning insurance companies who co-wrote the letter, personally delivered it to Lloyds of London last week. They also emailed copies to other insurance companies involved with fossil fuel projects. Their main demand was for insurance companies to commit to not insuring the East African Crude Oil Pipeline Project or Rosenbank, the biggest undeveloped oil field in the UK, both of which are currently seeking insurance. 

The letter gained more than 500 signatures from current university students and recent graduates by the end of May and remains open to signatures. It stated: “We refuse to put our professional careers at the service of climate wreckers that insure those responsible for the climate crisis. Insurers’ lack of action on climate change will cost them talented workers.” 

The insurance companies have yet to react to the letter or respond to the students’ meeting request. But Ruello is optimistic their demands will have an impact, as the insurance industry is ageing and dependent on new talent.

The insurance industry has also realised this. “Attracting Millennials and Gen Z talent means finding new ways to appeal to job seekers who have shown little interest in the insurance industry, up to this point,” Anna Beninger, the Global Head of Inclusion & Diversity at AXA Insurance, which was not named in the letter, wrote in a statement last year. 

Potential applicants could be swayed by a company’s climate policies. A recent survey published by Deloitte in 2023 revealed that 50 per cent of Gen Z respondents were pushing their employer to drive change on environmental issues while 42 per cent had already changed or were planning on changing jobs due to environmental concerns regarding their employer. 

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