Harmless Sky

From the TIMESONLINE website:

Climate change sceptics are to be targeted in a hard-hitting government advertising campaign that will be the first to state unequivocally that Man is causing global warming and endangering life on Earth.

The £6 million campaign, which begins tonight in the prime ITV1 slot during Coronation Street, is a direct response to government research showing that more than half the population think that climate change will have no effect on them.

Ministers sanctioned the campaign because of concern that scepticism about climate change was making it harder to introduce carbon-reducing policies such as higher energy bills.

The advertisement attempts to make adults feel guilty about their legacy to their children. It features a father telling his daughter a bedtime story of “a very very strange” world with “horrible consequences” for today’s children.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6867046.ece

You can also watch the advert using the link above to the TIMESONLINE website

Some  Harmless Sky readers have made complaints about the advertisement and I have started this thread because there is obviously going to be a lot of discussion about how the regulators react.

Alex Cull’s complaint can be found here

The full text of Robin Guenier’s complaint is here

Robin has also written to his MP, Peter Lilley, who was the only member of the House of Commons to speak out strongly against the Climate Bill.

I have received the following updates form Robin. Things seem to be moving very rapidly.

14/10/2009 16:13

I called Karen Harms [at the ASA] to discuss this. My fear was that, by turning this into a “political” issue the ASA might wash its hands of the affair & simply dump it on Ofcom - who, in turn, would prevaricate as they have with you, even deciding in the end that it isn’t political after all. But her line was busy & I left a voicemail. Then she called me, but I was on another important call &, this time, I missed her. However, she sent me an email with more detail which, to some extent, allays my fears. In my complaint, I cited ASA’s TV Code section 4 (d) [it’s interesting that they’ve already considered my complaint in some depth to get down to this detail!] - Section 4 is about “Political and Controversial Issues” and 4 (d) says that “No advertisement may show partiality as respects matters of political or industrial controversy or relating to current public policy”. That seems to distinguish “current public policy” from “political controversy” and I was concerned with the former not the latter.  She now (her latest email) relies on a note to Section 4 that says (para 2) “The term ‘political’ here is used in a wider sense than ‘party political’ - e.g. “campaigning for the purpose of influencing legislation or executive action …” and goes on to say (para 3) “The … investigation of complaints in relation to political advertising … remains a matter for Ofcom.”

She is (per her latest email) relying on that to say the 4 (d) part of my complaint is a matter for Ofcom not the ASA. Essentially that meets my concern - I refer to about 16 other sections of the Code and they stay with the ASA so my “dumping” fear is unfounded. But I’m unsure about 4 (d) anyway - I’m talking about “partiality” re “current public policy” and that, if I read ASA’s Code correctly, is not a “political” matter (see above) - unless they argue that the ad is designed to “influence” “executive action”. Why would the Government wish to influence its own action.

Anyway, I called her to discuss all this. And, once again, had to leave a voicemail - asking her to call me back. I’m waiting.

14/10/2009  16:33

I’ve now spoken to Karen. She was very helpful. She listened to my interpretation of their Section 4 and understood my points, saying she wasn’t herself able to agree or disagree with me although she appreciated my logic on the matter. She said, therefore, that she would contact Ofcom herself and get their view and contact me when she had done this. In the meantime, she confirmed that ASA (i.e. Karen) would be considering my overall complaint with specific reference to my other 16 Section references, noting that this would not preclude her from referring also to other relevant Sections that I might have missed.

I.E. she could hardly have been more helpful.
This seems, so far, to be moving remarkably quickly. I’ll keep you posted.

I am also moving relevant comments to this thread from the New Statesman thread. The problems with references to comment numbers are unavoidable I’m afraid.

UPDATE: It’s proved impossible to move the comments because the vast size of the NS thread makes the software I use fall over. If you want to refer to them you can create links by right-clicking on the comment number, selecting ‘link location’ and then pasting in a link in the usual way.

Discussion of the adverts on the NS thead starts here

Updates: 16/10/2009

If, after viewing the advert, you want to complain about it, then you can do so at the Advertising Standards Authority here:

http://www.asa.org.uk/asa/how_to_complain/complaints_form/

It was broadcast again on Thursday 16th October 2009  on ITV1 between 8.00 - 8.30 PM.

There is discussion of the government’s reaction to a flood of complaints about the advert at The Guardian website here.

Update 18/10/2009:

 Robin has received another response from the ASA. See his comment here.

Update 24/10/2009:

You can sign a petition against the government’s TV climate change adverts on the Downing Street website here:

http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/climate-ad/sign

 TonyB, A regular contributor here, has written a paper that adds  very interesting context to the governmen’s TV advertising campain. It can be found at Air Vent here:

http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/10/19/crossing-the-rubicon-an-advert-to-change-hearts-and-minds/

This has also been picked up by WattsUpWithThat as well.

I only got home last night after being out of the country for most of the last two and a half weeks. It may take a while to catch up, so if I have  missed anything important or urgent please leave a comment here.

The other day I was talking to a friend who had a serious problem with a large quango that is supposed to look after the countryside. He is unfortunate enough to have a remarkably robust species of lichen on his land that ecologists are interested in, and a Site of Special Scientific Interest has been created to ensure its protection, although there is absolutely no indication that the lichen is in any danger, or is ever likely to be.He needed to do some work in the area concerned and, although there was no question of the lichens being harmed, it was necessary to get permission from the quango. Letters and phone calls got him nowhere, so a site visit was arranged. He had assumed that, as is usually the case, once he met someone face-to-face common sense would prevail and an agreement which accommodated everyones interests would be quickly reached. He is rather proud of his lichens and is keen that they should continue to flourish.

At this stage I should say that the quango is very, very environmental and so is my friend. He moves in environmental circles, does environmental things, and is happily convinced that humans are destroying the planet, which gives him even more environmental things to do. On the other hand, there is a part of him that still takes a very levelheaded view of bureaucracy, activism and extremism.

When I spoke to him he said that the person from the quango and he had spent several hours walking the land, examining, considering and discussing everything. “And did you managed to sort it all out?” I asked. Read the rest of this entry »

Back in February I posted about BBC Newsnight - Warming up President Obama’s inaugural speech?  Aunty’s flagship current affairs magazine programme had taken three isolated phrases out of context from the speech and cobbled them together into what appeared to be a verbatim statement on global warming. This digitally created sound bite had then been used as an introduction to a report by Susan Watts, Newsnight’s Science Editor, which was recorded before the text of the speech became available, and evidently on the assumption that climate change would be a major feature in what the president had to say. In the event no single sentence in the speech, let alone a whole paragraph, was devoted to this subject.

I made a complaint about this and have also posted on various responses that the BBC have given me (here). The most recent one was a letter from the Editorial Complaints Unit (ECU) which I discussed here. Evidently the ECU were comfortable with what Newsnight had done, but perhaps they were unaware of the reaction to what became known as ‘splicegate’ in the great wide world outside their comfortable offices.

A vast number of blogs and web sites all over the world had picked up the story, as well as some of the MSM.  Not least was a site in the US with the quaint name (to British ears) of StinkeyJournalism, which seems to be a pretty fearsome watchdog on journalistic ethics over there. North Americans have a high regard for the BBC, and are shocked when it fails to live up to expectations. Read the rest of this entry »

Professor Bob Carter will be giving a lecture at 11.00 am on Wednesday 20^th May 2009 in the City of London. This is not a public event, but I understand that it may be possible for some members of the public to squeeze in.

If you would like to attend, then please let me know in a comment and I will put you in touch with the organisers.

The alarming rumours about George Monbiot that began to circulate on the internet last night have now taken a more sinister turn. Apparently the alarm was raised when he failed to turn up at the BBC Television Centre for a cocktail party to launch their Climate Change Causes Poverty season of documentaries. If even half of what is being said is true, then this should be a matter of grave concern to both warmists and sceptics.As yet, reliable information is hard to come by, but according to a report on the BBC’s website (which has now been taken down) the climate activist has been deeply depressed about new research that is due to be published in Science later this month. Apparently this provides robust evidence of solar influence on recent variations in global average temperatures. Read the rest of this entry »

Last April I had some All Fools Day fun with a photograph of a very exotic butterfly sitting on a bunch of primroses in our garden. This was in response to a front-page story in the Independent headed ‘How the blurring of the seasons is a harbinger of climate calamity’.  The article claimed that the somewhat archaic science of  phenology is a reliable method of detecting dramatic changes in the climate.In Victorian times it became fashionable to keep a natural history diary in which observations of any curiosities noticed on country walks or around the garden were noted. Of course first flowering dates were recorded together with other information about plants, birds and of course the weather. As such records proliferated they were collated and analysed. From this material the science of phenology developed: the study of recurring natural phenomena such as the onset of each season of the year.

During the twentieth century interest in phenology waned although the Royal Meteorological Society collected data until 1948. The reason for this fall from favour has been explained by Philip Eden, a vice-president of the RMS:

Plants and animals are, of course, affected by the weather, but they are affected by other things too. Information collected about flowering dates, hibernation times, the arrival and departure of snow and ice, are all called ‘secondary data’ or ‘proxy data’ by climate experts.
All these secondary indicators are affected by other factors such as human intervention, genetic modification, pesticides, fertilisers, pollution, and complex interactions with other elements of a changing ecology. Some of them respond to climate change with a delay of years or even decades.
Philip Eden, A Change in the Weather, p 188-9

But with the advent of concern about global warming, phenology has been revived. Over the last few years an ecologist called Dr Tim Sparks has been responsible for numerous stories in the media about early flowering dates, mushrooms that appear when least expected, and even the extension of the grass cutting season. Most recently he forecast that the UK would have its first ‘green Christmas’ this year, with leaves still on the trees. His research has, of course, been presented as incontrovertible evidence of man-made global warming, in spite of what the Royal Meteorological Society might think, and news media like The Independent and the BBC have been very happy to report his findings in these terms.

Read the rest of this entry »

(For nearly a year now, Peter Martin has been a regular contributor to a remarkable thread which started at the New Statesman and is now, nearly 6000 comments later, hosted at Harmless Sky. By energetically representing a point of view that most of the other contributors disagree with, he makes sure that none of us get complacent. Thanks Peter!)

There are many thousands of posts on numerous websites, both arguing for and against the scientific consensus position on global warming, or climate change if you prefer. There is probably no precedent for such a scientific controversy. Previous disputes about smoking and health, or evolutionary theory seem relatively tame by comparison. There have been other scientific controversies over the years, which have been settled, as they should in the way that science should settle them, by a process of discussion and acceptance. Famously, Einstein had conceptual problems with the ideas of quantum mechanics that were emerging in the 1920s and 30’s. Schrodinger, himself a pioneer of quantum mechanical theory, was uncomfortable with some of the philosophical implications, expressed doubts, asked difficult questions and was happy to test his own theories against the general scepticism of many physicists at the time. Read the rest of this entry »

In the first part of this post, I suggested that the global banking crisis, and an economic downturn that may lead to years of recession, will bring about a change in the general public’s attitude to global warming.

Concerns about climate change are hardly likely to compete for our attention with real day-to-day fears about employment, the cost of living, pensions, and even the security of our savings and our homes. Exhortations to have blind faith in a ‘scientific consensus’ are likely to fall on deaf ears, and appeals for self-sacrificing compliance with costly schemes to save the planet will prompt question about what these measures are likely to deliver.

Of course, this applies mainly to the domestic sector of the economy, but what will be the reaction in the commercial world and in the public sector? Will the currently fashionable acceptance of the doctrine of climate alarmism continue to be the norm, or will there be a growing scepticism here too?

When a recession bites, plans for long-term capital expenditure come under scrutiny; uncertainties are likely to be reassessed and particularly the credibility of predictions that underlie plans for the future. Here are some examples of how predictions about the future climate influence decision makers who need sound guidance if they are to avoid making very expensive mistakes.

In the wake of the West Country floods last summer, the Environment Agency launched a campaign to publicise the need for a new Thames Barrier to protect London from flooding.

The BBC reported the story in these apocalyptic terms: Read the rest of this entry »