Quaker climate expert in call for British Museum to ditch BP
'Friends were among hundreds of people who descended on the museum calling on it to end its deal with BP.'
A leading Quaker climate expert has put his name to a submission placing renewed pressure on the British Museum to cut ties with BP.
Quaker Paul Ekins, a professor of Resources and Environmental Policy at University College London, co-signed a letter to the gallery’s board of trustees arguing that pushing ahead with a renewed partnership with the oil giant could place them in breach of the museum’s own policies and conflict with standards governing the culture sector.
The submission from the Culture Unstained group, and signed by climate and museum experts and representatives of museum staff, came ahead of a mass demonstration on 23 April organised by the activist group ‘BP or not BP?’. Friends were among hundreds of people who descended on the museum calling on it to end its deal with BP as the decision over whether to renew the current contract looms. The action is thought to be the biggest protest since the group occupied the museum for three days with a Trojan horse and a 1,500-strong crowd in February 2020, just before lockdown.
After a freedom of information request, Culture Unstained said they discovered how leading figures from large corporations, including BP, are members of an ‘influential but almost entirely unaccountable’ group advising the British Museum. The museum has said claims it is inappropriately influenced by any donations or sponsorship ‘are simply incorrect’.
The museum is under mounting pressure to break its links to BP after the National Portrait Gallery and Scottish Ballet cut ties to the oil firm in February.
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