The BBC must air the views of climate change sceptics even though they are in the minority, the editor of Radio 4’s Today programme has said after he was criticised for allowing Nigel Lawson to feature in a debate. Jamie Angus, editor of Today, said Lord Lawson deserved to be heard despite holding a minority view. “The BBC can’t say, ‘We aren’t going to put that point of view on air because scientists tell us it’s not right’,” Angus said. --Anita Singh,
The Daily Telegraph, 14 July 2014
Appearing on the programme in February, Lord Lawson questioned whether extreme weather events – including flooding in the UK – had any link to climate change. Some listeners complained, and the BBC’s editorial complaints unit ruled that his views had been given undue prominence in the debate. Lord Lawson claims the “quasi-Stalinist” BBC has now banned him from appearing on the programme because his views clash with the corporation’s “own party line”. --Anita Singh,
The Daily Telegraph, 14 July 2014
On June 25, 2014, the Guardian published that Fraser Steel of the BBC Complaints Unit had written to complainant Chit Chong, a Green Party politician, stating that “Lord Lawson’s views are not supported by the evidence from computer modelling and scientific research”. In respect to the linkage between the floods and global warming, Fraser Steel’s views are unequivocally wrong. Even IPCC – surely the most fervent advocate of climate models imaginable – stated that GCMs did not provide useful information on precipitation extremes (and, a fortiori, floods). Inspired at least in part by Hoskins’ fellow Grantham Institute employee Bob Ward, the BBC has arrived at a factually incorrect and unfair decision in respect to the complaint against Nigel Lawson. --Steve McIntyre,
Climate Audit, 13 July 2014
The powers that be at the BBC seem to have decided that they want to put their considerable weight behind Mr Gore’s campaign. Gore was left free to propagate some wholly new errors, declaring that we have seen nothing like recent Australian droughts before. We can now begin to see how the BBC’s editorial policy is going to pan out. Sceptics are wrong even when they are right; politicians who question alarmism will therefore be introduced as being “wrong” and will be challenged on everything they say. Greens are right even when they are lying; they will be given a free pass and no challenge of their views is to be permitted. --Andrew Montford,
Bishop Hill, 13 July 2014
