Bishop Hill A letter to the Foreign Secretary
Nov 4, 2015 Bureaucrats ;)
Reader Alex Henney sends a copy of a letter that he has recently sent to Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond. It concerns our representative in Paris, Sir David King.
Dear Mr. Hammond,
Professor King and the Paris Conference of Parties
I write to object on several grounds to Professor King being UK climate representative at Paris.
The attached paper “The scientific flaws of the Committee on Climate Change and the expensive consequences” shows there is no need for significant concern about climate change.
Professor King knows very little about climate science and has a track record of naïve alarmism, if not semi hysteria:-
- In March 2004 he warned MPs that the Antarctic had already lost 40% of its ice and that the melting of the polar ice caps could cause a shift in the Gulf Stream which would lower temperatures in Britain and Europe by as much as 10°C. In fact the sea ice in Antarctica is at record extent since satellite assessment started in 1979. The IPCC does not rate the shift of the Gulf Stream as a likely risk
- In July 2004, as Government Chief Scientist, he attended an international seminar organised by the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow[1]. He started by claiming that two thirds of the invitees were “undesirable” and should not be allowed to speak. He asked Blair’s office and Foreign Secretary Jack Straw (who was in Moscow) at the time to put pressure on the Russian government that a ban be implemented. Then he threw a tantrum and walked out after being challenged by Paul Reiter[2] about the melting of snow at Kilimanjaro. At the end of the conference Alexander Illarionov, Chief Economic adviser to Putin, gave an angry press conference and laid into King, see attached
- He claimed in evidence to the House of Lords Select Committee on Economic Affairs[3] that “The science of climate change is a mature subject” (p96) and he then effectively contradicted himself by admitting that the effect of water vapour (which is critical to the assessment of whether clouds create negative or positive feedback) “is very difficult to model” – i.e. we do not know. As Richard Lindzen, Professor Emeritus of Atmospheric Science observed in a seminar in the Houses of Parliament in 2012, “Climate science is immature. It cannot forecast the past, let alone the future”
- In 2004 he incorrectly claimed that the earth’s temperatures had risen to their highest level for 60 million years”, which is definitely not true - temperatures in the Medieval Warming Period were possibly higher and they were probably higher, for periods 120, 330 and 410 thousand years ago to go back only that far[4]. He went on to suggest that by the end of the twenty-first century “Antarctica was likely to be the only habitable continent left on earth”, which is an absurd statement to say the least
- He gave a presentation at the London School of Economics which I attended. He showed a slide of CO2 levels and global temperatures over many millennia which was supposed to show the effect of higher CO2 levels on increasing temperature. But the temperatures increased before the CO2 levels increased. Cause does not follow effect, see my paper pp3, 4.
The book he co-authored “The Hot Topic” has numerous errors in it which are baseless scares:-
- p2 Gore’s polar bear nonsense – in fact with the ban on hunting they have increased in numbers
- p10 the exhibit of temperature from 1000-2000 is wrong, omitting the Medieval Warming period which the IPCC has now reinstated after the disgraceful pseudo-scientific episode of the hockey stick
- p23 “The ice cores also show that when carbon dioxide goes up, temperature goes up”. In fact what the ice cores show is that temperature precedes CO2 changes, see my paper pp3, 4.
- Despite the expenditure of £bns in research the IPCC has established no link between temperature and CO2, and has resolutely ignored the evidence of the sun’s influence on the climate. King runs this on p25.
- p26 He claims there has been a “dramatic rise in temperature in the last few decades” – not true; the increase in temperature from 1910-40 was similar to that of 1970s to late 1990s. And since then there has been no marked change in global temperature
- p30/ He claims “The final proof that greenhouse gases really are the problem comes from…Global Climate Models. In fact the models generally do a good job of explaining all the changes that have taken place in the twentieth century…” Neither of these claims are true, see my paper pp4, 5.
- p30 We have the scare story of Arctic ice disappearing – Arctic ice has recovered significantly, see my paper p8
- p49 “More Katrinas are likely to be on the way”. In fact he Great Miami hurricane of 1926 was more intense that Katrina. Chris Landsea, Science and Operations Officer of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, resigned from involvement in AR4 stating “There are no known scientific studies which show a conclusive link between global warming and hurricane frequency and intensity.” In a blog of November 2011 “Hurricanes and global warming” he observed that even if there were significant warming “The overall changes that may occur are relatively tiny and are several decades away.”
- p57 We are treated to the sea level scare of increasing rate of rise, which is not true. See my paper pp6, 7 – and scares about erosion and flooding and storm surges to coastal areas with the prospect of affecting billions of people – which we can ignore.
- p95 Under “Now for really bad news” we are told “it’s now almost certainly impossible to restrict warming to 2°C”. King is clearly ignorant of recent empirical research (as opposed to modelling) which shows that estimates of sensitivity have reduced, see Oversensitive: How the IPCC hid the good news on global warming, Nicholas Lewis and Marcel Crok.
Professor King is – or was – supposed to be a scientist. He should therefore be aware of Richard Feynman’s observation:-
“It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is. It doesn’t matter how smart you are, if it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong”.
The recently published report “Extreme weather and resilience of the global food system” is a waste of taxpayer’s money. In the foreword King states “we know the climate is changing”, which is a truism, “and weather records are being broken all the time”, which is nonsense. I am not going to waste my time criticising more of this stuff beyond observing that with an increase in population there could well be an increased risk to food supplies, but this is nothing to do with the weather. We have been here before starting with Malthus, on to the Club of Rome and the hysterics of Paul Ehrlich. (That said we should not be complacent).
There is a negligible chance that any agreement will be reached at Paris. The US Energy Information Administration has just published a briefing note on India’s coal plans, attached. Russia has stated it is not going to play, while China will go through a charade of words for the benefit of Obama.
As a citizen and taxpayer I take strong exception to Professor King representing me. His track record shows that he does not know what he is talking about, lacks judgment of reality, and appears to be intolerant of other’s views.
I copy this letter to Mrs. Rudd and to Professor King.
Yours sincerely,
ALEX HENNEY
------------------------------------------------------------
Extracts from Illarionov’s press conference on 8/7/2004
“These papers [presented by King and his team] differed dramatically from what is usually offered at international congresses and conferences. Simultaneously, they revealed an absolute – and I stress, absolute – inability to answer questions concerning the alleged professional activities of the authors of these papers. Not only the ten questions that were published nine months ago, but not a single question asked during this two-day seminar by participants in the seminar, both Russian and foreign, were answered…
The British participants insisted on introducing censorship during the holding of this seminar. The chief science adviser to the British government, Mr. King, demanded in the form of an ultimatum at the beginning of yesterday that the program of the seminar be changed and he presented an ultimatum demanding that about two-thirds of the participants not be given the floor…Mr. King spoke about “undesirable” scientists and undesirable participants in the seminar. He declared that if the old program was preserved, he would not take part in the seminar and walk out taking along with him all the other British participants. He has prepared his own program which he proposed, it is available here and my colleagues can simply distribute Mr. King’s hand-written program to change the program prepared by the Russian Academy of Sciences…”
“Other attempts were made to disrupt the seminar. At least four times during the course of the seminar ugly scenes were staged that prevented the seminar from proceeding normally. As a result we lost at least four hours of working time in order to try to solve these problems. During these events Mr. King cited his conversations with the office of the British Prime Minister and had got clearance for such actions.
And thirdly, when the more or less normal work of the seminar was restored and when the opportunity for discussion presented itself, where questions on professional topics were asked, and being unable to answer these questions, Mr. King and other members of the delegation, turned to flight, as happened this morning, when Mr. King, in an unprecedented incident, cut short his answer to a question in mid-sentence realising that he was unable to answer it and left the seminar room.
It is not for us to give an assessment to what happened, but in our opinion the reputation of British science, the reputation of the British government, and the reputation of the title “Sir” has sustained heavy damage.”
The transcript of the press conference was referenced in Booker’s book end note p137.
[1] Source pp114-116 The Real Global Disaster, Christopher Booker.
[2] Professor Reiter is a world leading specialist in mosquito-borne diseases. He resigned from involvement in AR3 because the IPCC insisted on claiming that global warming would encourage the spread of malaria. In AR5 the IPCC backed down stating “The many findings described above make it clear a vast body of scientific examination and research contradict the claim that malaria will expand across the globe and intensify as a result of CO2-induced warming.” Unlike Professor King, Professor Reiter takes care to ensure he knows what he is talking about. I did check with Professor Reiter about this episode and he confirmed it. In a letter to Nature he drew an analogy between the behavior of the “climate establishment and Lysenkoism, an illusion that became accepted as reality despite all contrary evidence, because it was continually affirmed at meetings and by the media.”
[3] Volume 2: Report, HL12-2, 6 July 2005, http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200506/ldselect/ldeconaf/12/12i.pdf
[4] See figure 3 in Carter’s book “Climate: The Counter Consensus”.
Reader Comments (38)
That is all much too logical and well-reasoned to get through to the eyes of Philip Hammond!
How ironic that the British get a lecture in censorship from the Russians. But that sums up the climate debate from the alarmist side, no debate allowed.
Dear Mr Henney,
Thank you for your letter which is receiving attention.
Third assistant secretary to the under-secretary for the Minister of State, Phillip Hammond.
(note - please dispose of this rubbish)
Not to mention this...
http://theclimatescepticsparty.blogspot.com/2015/02/lord-monckton-and-push-to-get-rid-of-pm.html
"The following Youtube was recorded during Lord Monckton's visit to Australia in September-October 2014.
An extract from Lord Monckton's presentation:
David King was asked whether all the nations of the world were now, in principle, ready to sign their people’s rights away in such a treaty. Yes, but there are two standouts. One is Canada. But don’t worry about Canada. They’ve got an election in the Spring of 2015 and we and the UN will make sure the present government is removed. He was quite blunt about it.
The other hold out is Australia. And Australia we can’t do anything about because Tony Abbott is in office until after the December 2015 conference. So that means you all have to guard Tony Abbott’s back. Because the Turnbull faction, in conjunction with the UN, will be doing their absolute level best to remove your elected Prime Minister from office before the end of his term and , in particular, before the end of 2015, so that they can get 100% wall-to-wall Marxist agreement. They do not want any stand-outs. And the most likely stand-out at the moment is Australia. So look after him."
Philip Hammond is another Oxford PPE graduate. He was Defence Secretary from 2011-14. His party failed to mention defence in their election manifesto this year. Last winter, a Russian submarine entered Faslane. Our Government called on the US, the Canadians and the French to hunt for it. Russian bombers have patrolled into sensitive airspace over the western approaches. Russian warships exercised in the Channel on election day. Philip Hammond's party cares little for such trivia, saving their intellectual horsepower for weightier matters. For example, they participated with other political parties in a joint statement on Climate Change at the start of the election campaign. Thus reassured, we could vote for any party in the sure knowledge that they have our best interests at heart.
Philip Hammond will skim Alex's letter, at best. He will do nothing.
1642, anyone?
(Sorry, forgot. The present Charles could raise his standard at Nottingham, but it would be a lonely ceremony).
By definition of how the civil service works, the letter to Philip Hamond will be read by a civil servant, who will write a reply, which Philip Hammond will sign without reading either letter.
In my Civil Service experience letters direct to a minister - unless you are one of their constituents (a) are often not even shown to the guy and (b) are indeed answered by very junior staff. This isn't too unfair - there are lots of such letters and lots of organised campaigns to which form letters are sent.
I'd have addressed the letter to my MP under a brief covering letter asking him politely to forward it to the minister for his views.
If you don't get a satisfactory reply to this letter you can still do that complaining about the quality of the reply - a letter from an MP gets an entirely different and better treatment than one direct from a member of the public
I suppose Sir David King ought to be asked which change in mankind's use of fossil fuels has caused the hiatus in global warming for the last 20 years.
It is a question that has been bugging me, but for some reason, Climate Scientists seem to have overlooked it.
King is a dummy, that of course can be useful has after he spouts his nonsense what he said can be written off has 'not representative' of the government.
So has a UK climate representative at Paris, he does have his uses as a 'true believer' he will find a warm welcome, and so can gain credit for the government, where has a man without any real power their is in practice little he can do.
The Gulf Stream system could weaken if the rate of global warming rises. However, as rising atmospheric temperatures would be the cause of such change, the local cooling due to reduced ocean heat transport will for some areas be compensated by temperature rises even with a weakened Gulf Stream.
An excellent letter. Well done Alex Henney.
No disrespect to the letter-writer but his ginormous ramble is a perfect example of why alarmists have gone so strongly for soundbites: '97%', 'Hottest year ever', 'the science is settled' etc. As others have observed, the minister responsible probably won't even see the letter let alone read it.
They know how to get the message across in a single punchline that non-experts (ie the public) can comprehend in 3 seconds flat. Whether the soundbite is factually accurate is neither here nor there.
Sceptics should've created their own soundbites to counter absurd alarmist claims by now but have not, and we all continue to pay the price for that failure.
@golf charlie:
The hiatus did not happen. It has been comprehensively shown not to have happened using at least one recent and entirely accurate computer model which uses figures that we adjusted only last week in order to disprove that it happened. All previous computer models which may have allegedly shown a purported hiatus have been decommissioned and may no longer be referred to. Similarly, any actual observations of real temperatures and/or trends thereof which purport to indicate that there has been a hiatus are to be discounted as alarmist propaganda which profoundly disagree with the accepted actual temperatures that the new model quite clearly shows, even if they originate from obvious skeptic shill organisations in the pay of global oil barons such as the execrable "NASA".
You may not use the term 'hiatus' or 'pause' when referring to the continuing, accelerating and catastrophic increase in global temperatures. To do otherwise will result in a visit from the men in black hats.
Move along. Nothing to see here.
"There is a negligible chance that any agreement will be reached at Paris. The US Energy Information Administration has just published a briefing note on India’s coal plans, attached. Russia has stated it is not going to play, while China will go through a charade of words for the benefit of Obama."
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/china-raises-coal-use/2238128.html
Well done to Alex Henney.
Let us all hope that Sir David King demonstrates his lack of scientific understanding in Paris, as he did in 2004 with the then Prime Minister's backing.
Perhaps the current UK Prime Minister has expressed his confidence in Sir David, hoping for a similar performance.
Concorde is no more, let us hope for Discorde in Paris.
Well he did predict the political situations in Canada and Australia with uncanny accuracy to be fair. He just missed his calling in life; he could have been the new Stalin.
You cannot fight politics with science. Hammond is a politician and King is a politician with a few letters after his name for legitimacy. There will be 35000 people in Paris whose income depends on keeping it all running and another 5 or 10,000 fanatics who are out and out green communists who will only listen to rabble rousing soundbites from their own side.
However there are 31 million voters in the UK and the steady education of them will eventually leave this lot isolated. (Note the result of the last election). One idea at a time, " record antarctic ice sheets". "No increase in Hurricane numbers." "Lots of polar bears". You only have to see zebedees contributions to see the failure in logic brought on by fanaticism. Her endlessly repeated soundbites are the diet of the rabble. We need to endlessly repeat soundbite to get a diet change.
I would suggest a more localised approach. Letters to local papers and local MP. Facebook and stuff like that (not that I use any of that junk). The fanatics have their "Transition Movement", financed by Government, and that is where the fight needs to be fought. I have friends who actually still think it is about the Environment!
M Pez, Michael Mann is working on the dendrochronology of fossilised computer records, with a bottle of Tippex, to white-out the end of the last ice age. The possibility that the rise in temperatures was good for human life, and may have been induced by a change in smelting bronze and iron, would be like discharging a CO2 fire extinguisher on the furnace of global warming.
King is the perfect candidate to negotiate for and represent alarmists, apparently.
It is better addressed to an MP. It was done as regards bad behaviour (usual) of the BBC and thus the BBC had to respond from the very top. Not to any avail and as usual.
King is an arrogant dog. Remember him here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/8418356.stm
via WUWT:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/24/bbc-botches-grade-school-co2-science-experiment-on-live-tv-with-indepedent-lab-results-to-prove-it/
Unlikely to cut much mustard with Hammond given his recent speech to the UN:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-h8gnFBEugg
To concede any of points in this letter Hammond would have to admit that he is either a fool or a liar.
I think it is a noble effort by Alex Henney but alas a wasted one.
These preposterous Berks and the likes of Hammond in particular along with all of his fellow political geeks - elitist Oxford indoctrinated graduates don't give four x about actual facts and never did.
Simply telling them the truth is so much wasted breath. That slicker and creepily sly Hammond, will know well that so much UK taxpayers foreign aid money, allotted to that egregious bunch of feckless empire building peculating tossers aka certain UN affiliated aid agencies is being overtly and outrageously squandered. But then, and it applies to HMG and Camerloons in general [and Blairs lot before them] - being seen to be doing the right thing, far outweighs the actualities of doing the right thing.
Furthermore, and without wishing to appear nitpicking. It is, albeit primarily a valid criticism, one must be very vigilant when making allegations not to conflate two issues which though closely related by Geography, region and climate but in fact are two separated processes and thus influenced by different motions, dynamics and influences, where one is continental in scale and the other heavily prejudiced by maritime conditions.
The claim that Antarctic has already "lost" 40% of its ice - is ludicrous nonsense and for King to quote it, is preposterous hyperbole. True enough the Antarctic sea ice is burgeoning and the latest and [very unsurprising to climate realists] but a big climb down for the warmistas, is the news coming out of NASA is that the Antarctic continental ice sheet is GROWING!
YES of course, the sea ice and continental ice mass are directly intertwined chief effects are FRIGID polar conditions [lack of sunlight] but sea ice is very much influenced by external factors - ie you've guessed it........ the sea.
Lastly, the Gulf stream is part and linked to the great oceanic conveyor, there is no reason to think that this mechanism has been in any way affected, effected by mankind's influence - none whatsoever. Though true enough, the north Atlantic drift influences the Arctic sea ice in ways which are poorly understood - and links to the Arctic oceanic oscillation.
We must be aware to get all facts - as straight as we can divine, then understand and then recount them - we do not desire to be as loose and as fast with the truth - as are all alarmists.
It is a very good letter, but sadly it will not influence our foreign secretary. The information about Illarionov's remarks were most illuminating. King is a buffoon. Sadly he is our buffoon.
Just hammer that point.
He's annoyed the Russians. Needlessly.
Regardless of which side of the debate you're on - he' s a bad representative for the UK.
Nothing will happen until we start suffering black-outs. The first step up the ladder to "the black cat in the coal cellar" is being taken now. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/11975069/Power-plant-breakdowns-force-National-Grid-to-issue-alert.html - shortage of power due to power plant break-downs. Who would have thought that?
A bit of further escalation and we will see power cuts. There will be loud complaints from the users and suddenly the newspapers will change tack and attack politicians and alarmists as they will want to continue with selling papers. The politicians will turn on the scientists including making funding cuts. Subsidies will be cut to pay for more traditional energy generation. That will all be interesting to watch.
Watch Paris collapsing http://www.thegwpf.com/us-congress-prepares-to-drive-a-stake-through-the-climate-vampires-heart/
Good luck to Mitch McConnell
Dear Sir David,
Dump the private jet. It makes you look like a bit of a hypocrite and could get you in trouble with RICO. Please find enclosed some bicycle clips for use on your journey to Paris.
Yours,
ALB.
That's a private jet, right..?
Of course - you're not thinking of using it, are you..?
I mean - that would be hypocrisy, and politicians don't go in for that sort of thing, do they..?
Kim Philbys of our days do not work undercover.
I agree with Phillip Bratby and Roger Hird.
My letter to minister Amber Rudd via the department's e-portal was answered by a civil servant who did not sign their name. By contrast my letters to my MP were forwarded to the minister and I received short replies from the minister himself.
So if you want to get a reply from the minister then it seems best to write to your MP.
Idiot_Wind on Nov 4, 2015 at 7:05 PM
My understanding is that a letter to an MP, from a member of the public from outside the MP's constituency, has not entered the political system at all. I would also expect the letter writer would need to be on the electoral roll of that MP's constituency.
Watching the Professor in front of the jet:
“Comrades!' he cried. 'You do not imagine, I hope, that we pigs are doing this in a spirit of selfishness and privilege? Many of us actually dislike milk and apples. I dislike them myself. Our sole object in taking these things is to preserve our health. Milk and apples (this has been proved by Science, comrades) contain substances absolutely necessary to the well-being of a pig. We pigs are brainworkers. The whole management and organisation of this farm depend on us. Day and night we are watching over your welfare. It is for your sake that we drink the milk and eat those apples.”
As an indicator of the present Governments abilities, Sir David King is the most appropriate representative.
Alex Henney's comprehensive analysis of Professor King's diplomatic skills shows, if fact, that he is the ideal representative of the UK in the grotesque farce that will be COP21, as already indicated by Knr @ 11.42, Golf Charlie @12.57 and Hunter@ 1.34. As an added bonus (M.Courtney @ 4.09) he has pissed off the Russians.
He can be guaranteed to support the EU position which is conditional on an impossible "binding agreement". I even expect the EU to agree to Article 11 (7) Option 2 the "International Tribunal of Climate Justice" , which has no chance being contrary to the US constitution and is dead in the water.
http://www.thegwpf.com/us-congress-prepares-to-drive-a-stake-through-the-climate-vampires-heart/
Without "Cash in hand" the third world is going to walk. The likeliest outcome is, a series of sub-committees will be created to "negotiate" progress "going forward" whilst the parties indulge in a blame game.
I look forward to Prof. Kings next appearance before the commons select committee on the failure of COP21.
Currently, all links point to
http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2015/11/4/a-letter-to-the-foreign-secretary.html
except the 'parliament.uk' and 'paper' links
Is it possible to repair this?
Alex who?
ok ok so I "skimmed" the usual deluded rubbish (much of it arising from ignorance of basic Physics) and then noticed the "see my paper" comments. Could I be I wondered....
So........ I went to "see your paper" and laughed and laughed and laughed......more time on your hands than sense. Incidentally where was that published then?
Good to dip back in to see nothing at all has changed here on old Bishops Hump.
Still chuckling.....:-))
Onbyaccident, are you still standing by Michael Mann's Hockey Stick graph?
Which of the hiatus theories are you settling on?
Is there enough time to save the polar bear and arctic ice cap from extinction?
Still chuckling as nothing has changed in global warmings lack of hump? It is not was predicted, is it?
Meanwhile more UK redundancies due to expensive energy costs, and the National Grid almost runs out of electricity, because solar and wind aren't producing anything, and it is not that cold yet. All predictable, noted here, and ignored by idiots.
Perhaps you should acquire some basic common sense, before revisiting basic physics.
"There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact"
-Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
Nice to see some of the pause deniers can laugh though. Usually they are just doom and gloom merchants.
What makes me laugh are the proponents of 'basic physics' who then go on to tell us that the deep ocean is hiding the missing heat without it being detected at the surface, or that a cooling Antarctic is caused by a warming world, or that a warming sea is somehow a CO2 sink rather than a source. Funny how it's not so 'basic' when their simplistic linear, two-variable hypothesis is disproven by nature and they have to rely on a myriad of contradictory, unphysical excuses.
Meantime the beneficial and mostly natural 0.6K/century (none of which was in the last 20 years) continues to confuse the simpletons. Best not even remind them that their simple-minded cures are demonstrably worse than the putative disease and that millions will suffer because of it - because complex thinking is just not in their toolkits.
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts." Bertrand Russell