Just to make it absolutely clear: the Sunday Express page one story here about BBC pensions and climate change follows on from what B-BBC exclusively revealed on Monday.
What’s fascinating about how fast the warnming bubble is now bursting (in some quarters – not the BBC!) is that the MSM are now falling over themselves to follow up blogs like this – three months ago they didn’t give a hoot. But of course, in the world of the MSM, credit where credit is due is not a term they recognise.
Better late than never, a new Open Thread comes along! So, what is bugging you about the BBC today?
My, who would have guessed that striking parallels between the BBC’s coverage of the global warming debate and the activities of its pension fund are revealed today.
The corporation is under investigation after being inundated with complaints that its editorial coverage of climate change is biased in favour of those who say it is a man-made phenomenon. The £8billion pension fund is likely to come under close scrutiny over its commitment to promote a low-carbon economy while struggling to reverse an estimated £2billion deficit.
Concerns are growing that BBC journalists and their bosses regard disputed scientific theory that climate change is caused by mankind as “mainstream” while huge sums of employees’ money is invested in companies whose success depends on the theory being widely accepted. The fund, which has 58,744 members, accounts for about £8 of the £142.50 licence fee and the proportion looks likely to rise while programme budgets may have to be cut to help reduce the deficit. The BBC is the only media organisation in Britain whose pension fund is a member of the Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change, which has more than 50 members across Europe. Its chairman is Peter Dunscombe, also the BBC’s Head of Pensions Investment.
EU referendum’s Richard North leads the way yet again today in exposing that the IPCC 2007 report not only got it drastically wrong about melting Himalayan glaciers and disappearing Amazon rain forest, but also about serious food shortages in Africa. It’s deja vu – all over again! – because the IPCC report depended on inflated claims from a pressure group rather than scientific fact. The BBC, of course, as Richard points out, swallowed the bogus claims hook, line and sinker and in a chart about the impact of climate change, has this about Africa:
Projected reductions in the area suitable for growing crops, and in the length of the growing season, are likely to produce an increased risk of hunger. In some countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced by up to 50% by 2020.
But the BBC’s involvement in spreading these untruths about climate change in Africa goes much deeper and is much more sinister. As I pointed out last week, the World Service Trust, funded predominantly by grants from our taxes by the UK government and the EU, runs a scheme to ‘educate’ African journalists about the dangers of global warming, and to train them how to spread propaganda based on the premise that the West – as the main originator of CO2 emissions – is responsible for virtually all Africa’s woes. The Trust is deadly earnest in its mission, and recently published a lengthy and lavishly produced policy briefing on the topic. This, in the light of Richard North’s revelations, is a tissue of political proopaganda and misinformation. You need to read it it to realise the sheer scale of this lunacy. It beggars belief. Masquerading as ‘research’, it is actually a vitriolic polemic against the West. This is a taster:
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) places Africa at special risk from climate change, in part because of its lack of capacity to adapt to changing environmental realities. Sufficient support to enable African governments and citizens to adapt to climate change will be a key ingredient of any successful international treaty. A major policy conclusion of this report is that meeting the
information and communication needs of African citizens should be considered as a critical component of adaptation strategies around climate change. Providing African citizens with the information they need to respond and adapt to climate change is just one component of probable forthcoming debates around climate change in Africa. A central issue is one of environmental justice. African citizens will be among the most affected by climate change but are least responsible for the greenhouse gases that have caused it. They cannot make just demands on the rest of the world, or determine properly their own political and other responses to this emerging crisis, without being informed about its causes and its consequences. African citizens need better information on climate change, but they also need far better ways of communicating their reality and perceptions on the issue to those principally responsible for causing it.
Thus, the BBC is hard at work with your cash, hell bent on a political mission to persuade millions of Africans that a series of cobbled together lies are the truth. Its co-conspirators are the EU and the government.
The BBC very belatedly and no doubt even more begrudgingly has commissioned a poll probing views about global warming. Despite the years of BBC propaganda to the opposite, a total of 73% are not convinced that climate change has anything to do with humans; only 26% believe it is man-made, a drop from 42% a year ago when the Times newspaper conducted a similar poll. So who does the BBC turn for comment about the results? Why, of course, a spoksman from DEFRA, who professes himself “very disappointed”. What? – that the British people don’t accept being mugged by a battery of government climate change taxes?
It comes as no surprise that there is nothing at all in the report from the ‘sceptics’. And David Shukman, who reported the poll on BBC News 24 in funereal tones last night, blathered on about how people’s views went against what he said was unquestionably “mainstream science”.
Meanwhile, the Today programme this morning continued on its warming mission by bringing on a Green Party candidate and a carbon-obsessed academic to discuss how CO2 taxes must be introduced on everyone who owns a cat or a dog. I kid you not. It would be funny if it weren’t so tragic that the BBC’s editorial values have been traduced in this way.
Although there was plenty of news on the BBC about Geert Wilders last year when he was banned from entering the UK, now that he’s on trial in the Netherlands, the BBC has gone quiet.
One would have thought there would be much material to interest the world’s foremost news organ in this story. For a start the 15 defence witnesses that the court has disallowed, leaving only three, and causing Mr Wilders’s supporters to wonder whether the trial can have a fair outcome.
Those of us who are hurt, offended or frightened by anti-Semitism should always apply a test whenever negative feelings about Islam overcome us.
We have to ask ourselves whether our negative thought is rational and based on a genuine concern, or just a phobia-like distaste, a tarring with the same brush, a generalisation based on myth and mystery as per anti-Semitism.
While we mustn’t scapegoat groups of people, dehumanise them or blame them for all the evils in the world, surely we can criticise what needs criticising, and not be afraid to make value judgments when necessary.
At the time of writing, most references to Geert Wilders on the BBC website are dated last year; one by Mark Mardell actually puts his case in a reasonably evenhanded manner.
Many people distance themselves from Geert Wilders’s campaign, but there is considerable and undeniable logic in what he is saying, which should be reported and given a fair hearing. So for that reason I think the BBC should not only be reporting the trial, but also discussing the issues it brings up.
Here’s a letter a colleague has just received from the BBC’s complaints unit. I reproduce it in all its glory so it can be fully savoured:
I understand you’re unhappy with the BBC’s reporting of climate change as you feel we’ve been biased towards the AGW’s point of view. The BBC is committed to impartial and balanced coverage when it comes to this issue. There is broad scientific agreement on the issue of climate change and we reflect this accordingly; however, we do aim to ensure that we also offer time to the dissenting voices.
Flagship BBC programmes such as Newsnight, Today and our network news bulletins on BBC One have all included contributions from those who challenge the general scientific consensus recently and we will continue to offer time to such views on occasion. You might be interested in the views of former Newsnight editor, Peter Barron, who explored this issue in an online posting at our Editors’ Blog and explained some of the editorial issues it throws up.
I can assure you that we’re committed to honest, unbiased reporting and are determined to remain free from influence by outside parties, whether political or lobbyists. Our Charter and Agreement allows us independence from political pressure and the licence fee gives us independence from advertising, shareholder or other commercial interests. Impartiality forms the cornerstone of BBC News and Current Affairs and we’ve nothing to gain by weighting our coverage in political terms or by allowing influence from any other outside body.
I appreciate you may still believe the BBC is biased with regards the climate change argument and so I’ve registered your comment on our audience log. This is a daily report of audience feedback that’s circulated to many BBC staff, including members of the BBC Executive Board, channel controllers and other senior managers. The audience logs are seen as important documents that can help shape decisions about future programming and content. Thanks again for taking the time to contact us.
Regards
Joe O’Brien
BBC Complaints
Thrown up yet? Note that the official line is still that there is a consensus. Laughable, if it wasn’t so serious a subject. Meanwhile, the Spectator has a cracking piece which shows how totally cuplable the MSM have been in not reporting ‘climate change’ – and ends on a note that the BBC should be responding to.
In Roger Harrabin’s latest article about what he calls the “hue and cry” surrounding the Rajendra Pachauri “manhunt” (not betraying your feelings much there, Roger) the BBC’s environment analyst says that he’s been having difficulty getting in touch with one of the co-chairs of the IPCC working group which oversaw the inclusion of the discredited Himalayan glacier info:
Professor Parry has repeatedly refused to answer my questions about the genesis of the errors, and his out-of-office assistant now says he is travelling for a month.
A lame excuse by Parry, and the fact that Harrabin mentions it suggests he’s not convinced.
When Andrew Montford of Bishop Hill fame tried to find out some fairly straightforward information about the BBC’s involvement in Harrabin’s Cambridge Media and Environment Programme, here’s how the BBC explained its tardy response to his FOI request:
I am writing to advise that unfortunately we are not in a position to provide you with a response to your requests for information made under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. This is due to the fact that Roger Harrabin has been abroad and then on leave for much of the last six weeks and is now tied up with pressing stories.
Well, it’s just so difficult keeping in touch these days isn’t it?
UPDATE. It’s unrelated to the above post but I can’t resist sharing this headline: Hackers Steal Millions in Carbon Credits
The madness of it all in six words.
Well folks, another week has gone by since we last met, and tonight I bring you QT Live in the absence of our good friend the All Seeing Eye, Geoff. So I am hosting and moderating this evening so best foot forward and see you at half past Ten. On the panel this evening are chuckling Charlie Falconer, Gorgeous George Galloway, Theresa May (but they again she may not), the fragrant Clare Short (On to discuss “Mo”) and finally, Melanie Philips, the only person worth listening to on this panel tonight. Hope you can clear your diary and potter along…see you ALL later!
