Society rejects action on climate

Jan 5, 2013
Bishop Hill in Climate: CRU

Public support for action on global warming has fallen in fairly spectacular fashion according to the British Social Attitudes Survey.

There has been dramatic decline over the past decade in the public's support for tackling climate change in Britain. Backing for higher green taxes and charges has waned and scepticism about the seriousness of the threat to the environment has increased.

Climategate is cited as a key factor in the fall in support. And rightly so - the Russell panel noted that CRU and IPCC had both been guilty of misleading policymakers over the "hide the decline" episode, and there has been no meaningful investigation into allegations of journal nobbling.

Upholders of the consensus may yell that none of this changes the science, and this is true. But Climategate shows us that the process by which governments have been persuaded that we have a problem is biased. That being the case, the public are right to want a halt to policy responses.

Article originally appeared on (http://www.bishop-hill.net/).