Baillie Gifford has cancelled all of its remaining sponsorship deals with literary festivals after protests over its links to Israel and fossil fuel companies.
The investment management firm refused to confirm that it had taken the decision, but the Guardian has heard from Cambridge, Stratford, Wigtown and Henley literary festivals that the company had decided not to continue its partnership with them.
Cheltenham literary festival, which announced the end of its partnership with Baillie Gifford on Wednesday, also indicated that the decision had come from Baillie Gifford.
The Borders book festival announced this week that it had decided to end Baillie Gifford’s sponsorship after this year’s event. Wimbledon BookFest has confirmed that its sponsorship from the firm will be ending after eight years, but it did not disclose whether the decision came from festival organisers or Baillie Gifford.
The move comes after mounting pressure from the campaign group Fossil Free Books (FFB), which has called on the company to cease its investments in the fossil fuel industry and also demanded it divest from companies linked to Israel, as it believes “solidarity with Palestine and climate justice are inextricably linked”.
Last month, the Hay festival organisers took the decision themselves to end Baillie Gifford’s sponsorship, while the Edinburgh international festival organisers and the asset manager “collectively agreed” to terminate theirs.
While this means that the company no longer sponsors any literary festivals, it remains the sponsor of the UK’s most prestigious prize for nonfiction, the Baillie Gifford prize.
“The Baillie Gifford prize for nonfiction has happily partnered with Baillie Gifford since 2016,” a spokesperson from the prize said. “We have always found them to be collaborative, generous and transparent about their investments. They are contracted to sponsor the prize until the end of 2025 and we are fully committed to that relationship.”
Last month, more than 700 writers and publishing industry professionals signed an open letter organised by FFB, calling on Baillie Gifford to divest from fossil fuels and cease its links to Israel.
FFB said in a statement: “Over the last 18 months, research by multiple human rights NGOs has shown that Baillie Gifford holds investments worth billions in fossil fuel companies and companies with links to Israeli occupation, apartheid and genocide.
“Our research into Baillie Gifford’s investments is ongoing and we expect to release more news regarding the firm’s problematic investments in the coming days.”
The campaign group added that while it was “encouraged that an institution with such problematic investments will no longer play a role in the UK literary scene”, its “primary demand has always been for Baillie Gifford to divest”.
“FFB will continue to organise – alongside the wider divestment movement – until Baillie Gifford lives up to its claim to be a ‘responsible investor’ by divesting from fossil fuels and companies associated with human rights abuses,” the statement said.
The Hay festival was the first to pull out of its sponsorship deal with the firm, after a number of those scheduled to appear at the 2024 event, including the Labour MP Dawn Butler, the singer Charlotte Church and the comedian Nish Kumar pulled out in solidarity with FFB. Two days into the festival, Hay announced its decision to withdraw from the sponsorship deal.
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“Our first priority is to our audience and our artists,” Hay’s chief executive, Julie Finch, said at the time. “Above all else, we must preserve the freedom of our stages and spaces for open debate and discussion, where audiences can hear a range of perspectives.”
The Edinburgh international festival announced its decision the week after, with Jenny Niven, the book festival’s director, saying it had been taken “with great regret” and due to “intolerable” pressure on her team, rather than out of agreement with FFB’s stance. She said she did not believe “undermining the long-term future of charitable organisations” was “the right way to bring about change”.
Baillie Gifford has not commented on any of the sponsorship withdrawals since Edinburgh’s, when Nick Thomas, a partner at Baillie Gifford, said the firm’s sponsorship of the festival, which had been in place since 2004, “was rooted in our shared interest in making Edinburgh a thriving and culturally vibrant place to live and work”.
“We hold the activists squarely responsible for the inhibiting effect their action will have on funding for the arts in this country,” Thomas added.
“The assertion that we have significant amounts of money in the occupied Palestinian territories is offensively misleading. Baillie Gifford is a large investor in several multinational technology companies, including Amazon, Nvidia and Meta. Demanding divestment from these global companies, used by millions of people around the world, is unreasonable and serves no purpose. Much as it would be unreasonable to demand authors boycott Instagram or stop selling books on Amazon.”
Baillie Gifford was also not a “significant fossil fuel investor”, Thomas said. “Only 2% of our clients’ money is invested in companies with some business related to fossil fuels. We invest far more in companies helping drive the transition to clean energy.”