RUTHFULLY YOURS

Although I risk immediately being branded mentally defective for saying so, I am not convinced by the notion of man-made global warming. My lack of conviction, I would be the first to admit, is based on nothing resembling great scientific understanding: I have not so much as an O-level in physics or chemistry. All I do know is this: that the planet has heated up and cooled down at various points in its history without any help from factories, lorries or a beef-farming industry. Other planets have done, and continue to do, the same: I am still waiting for an answer to John Redwood’s excellent point that the surface temperature of Mars has risen over the past few decades “and they are still looking for the 4x4s that did it”. I therefore remain, in the phrase of Sir Antony Jay, the creator of Yes Minister, a firm thermosceptic.

Various other factors have contributed to an acceleration of my thermoscepticism. There was Lord Lawson’s detailed and challenging riposte to the Stern report. There is Christopher Booker’s superb recent book, The Real Global Warming Disaster, which I recommend that you all read. There is the hectoring tone of the BBC on the question, where any contributor to any programme who appears to be a thermo-denier is treated with incredulity and astonishment.

Also, thermomania has become the latest rallying point for the Leftist rent-a-mob, which finds it a suitable focus for its hatred of capitalism and the established order. That so many respectable people feel happy getting into bed with international anarchy would be funny were it not so threatening to our futures.

The latest blow to the thermomaniacs is the leak of emails from the University of East Anglia which suggest a complete unwillingness to engage with the opposite point of view. This was rather how the church used to behave before Martin Luther, and it enforced its will by torture and burnings at the stake. With those sanctions not currently available, the thermomaniacs prefer simply to pretend that the argument has only one side.

That argument – well, their argument – seems also to have reached ludicrous levels. We are told to stop eating beef because eructating bovines are also damaging the planet. This is an object lesson in the madness of these people. Not only is there no proof that every time a cow passes wind a flower dies, but such absurd claims are made with an utter disregard for the economy of large parts of the world (mainly the Third World) that depend on such farming. Mind you, the only time I ever attended a Green Party conference, 20 years ago, I heard a woman tell the assembly (to their agreement) that the population of this country would have to be halved to 30 million; though she failed to explain how this would be achieved.

Nutters, anarchists, anti-capitalists, fanatics, absolutists: why are these people taken seriously? Three cheers for the Australians, who this week have started to rise up against this indoctrination and lunacy. Three cheers for David Davis and the Tories who think like him, who are at last telling Dave that this particular bit of grandstanding and bunny-hugging has the potential to cause the most extreme economic and political damage. At last, there is recognition not just that there are two sides to every story, but that when politicians conspire to limit argument, it is always an attack on the public interest.

So if, next week, the Copenhagen summit passes from fraudulence to complete collapse, and misery and panic break out, no one should feel it is the end of the world – yet.