Bishop Hill Better...but enough?
Oct 27, 2010 Climate: Parliament I thought the committee's performance was much better than last time around - I got the impression of best efforts being made by most members, but it's always difficult for people coming to an issue fresh to properly question people with an in-depth knowledge. This is only worse when the witnesses are such expert dodgers and weavers and avoiders of questions.
When you are live-blogging you can't really watch the video, so I'd like to take another look at how the witnesses reacted. There are certainly a number of the responses where the answers appeared to contradict my understanding of the facts. There was obviously also a great deal of waffling and avoiding of questions, particularly by Russell. One hopes that the committee were suitably unimpressed.
The question now becomes whether the committee will issue a report, take the issue forward in some other way, or simply let it drop. I have no feeling for which way they will turn. They can have little doubt that all was not well with the inquiries, and logic would therefore dictate that they take some further action. But of course, logic is not always a factor in matters of public policy.
Reader Comments (21)
I guess we now know why inquiries at the US Congress make do mostly without all the British niceites
Just from the spectacle...
Russell has the least to lose. He was a bluffer... but at least he made eye contact. Davies not making any eye contact whatsoever was very negative. There was also latent aggression from Davies that he failed to hide.
Whether Russell realised it or not, but in his waffle, he gave the impression that is inquiry was not serious. Nice little jaunt. We couldn't ask searching questions for any number of reasons. He would have been better just keeping quiet. Whilst trying to justify their actions he reduced the implied authority of his inquiry with every word.
Acton was just a startled Rabbit in the Headlights. He nearly wet himself with one direct question, and palmed it off as quickly as he could.
Davies is clearly the key behind all these inquiries.
If I was a juror, he was guilty.
The inquiries were whitewashes. UEA selected the panel members, they selected the papers, they set the agendas and the remits.
Some of UEA's subsequent actions are in stark contrast to the words spoken.
1. UEA and CRU reviews stated the science was sound.
Action - the admission now that CRU science was not replicable has led to the UEA promising more openess and transparency with regard the data, the meta-data and FOIA requests.
2. There were no tricks.
Action - UEA are to employ professional statisticians.
3. CRU were not involved in undermining the peer review and and IPCC processes.
Action - CRU scientists are now directly managed by the School of Environmental Sciences and CRU practices are scrutinised.
4. CRU are not correcting or retracting flawed scientific papers.
Action - None.
5. UEA set up whitewash inquiries.
Action - None.
Acton looked on the defensive to me. A lot of hand gestures at the beginning of the session when he was answering questions. Arms folded when Davies was talking
Sorry what was also clear is that they had no friendly face to latch onto. They were exposed and that came across. And Stinger did not have to appear to be a lone voice.
He had no one undermining him on the committee with softball questions to Wilson Keppel and Betty.
Yes - it was better than the previous one (Oxbourgh), and miles better than the March one before the General elections - probably because at least some members seemed to have looked at a certain report by Your Grace!
But it won't be enough, not even a nice little report will be enough because these would just be another stack of paper, never mind if it's critical of CRU and the whitewashers.
Only action will be enough, for example a drastic reduction in CAWG/Greenie spending, come the budget next year. Let's hope that the ConDem members on the committee can persuade the Chancellor that this would be a nice little saver ...
I have no doubt the committee won't take any action themselves, but the poor performances, the admissions and the omissions by Russell, Acton and Davies have not in anyway put this matter to rest. Their evidence will be picked apart and laid bare for all to see.
A small corterie of activists at CRU has irrepably damaged climate science, the peer review process, the IPCC, the environmental movement, the UN, and governments' policies on energy from here to Timbuktu.
If you want to see how the Guardain has covered this go to
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2010/oct/27/hacked-uea-emails-cru
Bland is a good word to describe it , killing interest by makign it very dull is another.
Viv Evans said:
Exactly. The combination of dreadful UEA science and the pressing need for savings could be self-reinforcing. The coalition is very unlikely IMHO to back out of CAGW in theory. But in practice, making the savings should be a net vote winner. Worth watching.
Off topic slightly but given the guardian's write up with obligatory conclusions about the science which were not actually tested in the reviews and the title of the piece, does anyone have news on when the constabulary will report on whether the emails were leaked or hacked?
Imagine if it had been a Q.C. questioning!
Sorry Bish but I have to disagree (for probably the first time!) with you on the "it's always difficult for people coming to an issue fresh to properly question people with an in-depth knowledge".
The trio (I really am struggling not to use expletives here) have been here before and as this is THE Science and Technology Committee. They really should be up to the job and know the subject or there is no point in the committee. Billions are riding on the AGW garbage they spout and to have Acton, a non scientist, up there is insulting enough.
The "Trio" must have had a good laugh afterwards and I would hazard a guess that the Dennis Healey quote about an attack from Geoffrey Howe came to their minds when considering the committee......“It's like being savaged by a dead sheep”!
Sadly, another chance lost from people that are to polite to ask the real searching questions and allowing people to filibuster!
Lack of preparedness, being blinded by science and the complexities, finding it hard to deal with dissemblers.........
I wonder if it's not a case of being reluctant to be seen as playing a major part in bringing the CAGW cardhouse tumbling down which tempered their approach. The Climate Change Act was passed with five nayes as I recall.
I have yet to have the time to watch the session - however...
The committee's members are capable politicians. I imagine they are well aware that the Whitewash Gang could have been reduced to spluttering incoherence by firm questioning and by insisting on meaningful answers.
However, to the mass of CAGW Believers, this would have come across as extreme hostility to the witnesses. I imagine they decided, in advance, to take a softly-softly approach and to allow the Gang to generate yards of rope, ready for the hanging which, one day, will take place.
My suspicion
Publically, this will be the end of the line, and the controversy will disappear from view while the Government continues to spread the same message regarding global warming. This will last until the next couple of cold winters lead to an erosion of public confidence in the (big) AGW theory (you can tell people it's getting warmer, but if the evidence of their own eyes categorically disproves this, it doesn't matter how many scare adverts you broadcast), at which point at least the Conservatives will quietly slide across to some other environmental disaster meme (whether acidification or biodiversity).
Behind the scenes, CRU loses a significant amount of both grant money and influence (watch who gets nominated to the IPCC AR5 and any subsequent reports).
One would hope that the Commitee conclude that the UAE has not properly dealt with the issue itself and that a fully independent inquiry should be commissioned.
So, according to Trevor Davies' testimony this morning, the chronology is:
The proposed list of papers for Oxburgh to consider was discussed verbally by himself and Martin Rees of the Royal Society "at the end of February or beginning of March."
On the 4th March, the list was sent to the Royal Society.
On the 12th March, Davies emailed Rees saying that Oxburgh wanted to be able to say that the list had been chosen “in consultation with the Royal Society.”
On the 12th March the Royal Society responded saying they were "content with the list."
I suppose it all hinges on what you mean by consultation!
Somehow that didn't seem to come across too clearly. I hope the committee spotted it.
They were very plausible and Sir Humphrey Appleby would have been proud of them. On the other hand, the Committee was far better prepared than the one in the spring and this time it was not only Graham Stringer who asked pointed questions. Profs Acton and Davies seem to have put CRU on tighter leash, which is progress: the Profs need to ensure that they never again have to answer for their University's actions. My heart sank when I heard that Climatologists (I refuse to call them Climate Scientist) refer to computer simulations as experiments. As I simulate on my computer all day, can I be called a Climatologist too?
Ian B,
"Publically, this will be the end of the line, and the controversy will disappear from view while the Government continues to spread the same message regarding global warming. "
The UK government has let itself be lead up a blind alley with Global Warming, together with the EU and other governments. I think they are now having a drawn out "Oh Shit!" moment, but they can't very well say it was all a big mistake and set to work to dismantle the apparatus put in place to combat climate change. The big fear must be that we have a couple of cold winters with power cuts because electricity generation has suffered through the CAGW twaddle. Whichever crowd are in power then are likely to cop the blame for the lot.
A few weeks back, Caroline Spelman was talking about adjusting to climate change rather than fighting it. I see this as a recognition that if they keep going full steam ahead on CAGW they will hit the rocks, but they don't find it easy to change course or stop. There's a lot of inertia built up behind it.
If my (limited) experience of select committees is anything to go by, if the members think they've been misled or not taken seriously, they can call witnesses back in. Stringer certainly seems sceptical of the CRU and UEA
Too right there's a lot of inertia behind it (CAGW). The effect of the exceedingly generous Feed-in-Tariffs for renewable energy systems means that thousands of cowboy developers are rushing in to sell small scale (500kW) wind turbines and fields full of solar panels to gullible landowners.
Farmers are being offerred about £3k per hectare to host solar panels and the developers will reap a harvest of about £80k per hectare in income. The amount of electricity produced is derisory, the impact on the landscape is horrendous, but the profits are enormous (not surprising when they get paid over 30p per unit compared to about 5p per unit for conventional power stations). We the consumers are gradually paying more and more each year to subsidie this scam. Watch out for lots of applications for wind turbines and fields full of solar panels near you.
I just worked out that officially my household is in fuel poverty since more than 10% of my after tax income goes on electricity, heating oil and producing wood. I bet the government figures on households in fuel poverty are way lower than reality as they won't include households like mine (ex-professional on a reasonably good company pension). The figures can only get worse if the climate change policy continues.
I've just watched the "show".
I'm not sure who should get higher marks on the art of obfuscation and misdirection, not to mention the purveyance of fog and mush: Acton or Muir-Russell. So we peons (in the eyes of noble climate scientists) are not capable of understanding (or even commenting, let alone, God forbid, questioning) because we're not climate scientists.
Yet these two (neither of whom is a scientist - let alone a "climate scientist") would have the world believe their assessment that CRU's science is perfectly fine (notwithstanding the fact that no one has looked at it, except with eyes wide shut!)
But I did get a good laugh when Acton (supposedly an historian) - during the course of his bobbing, weaving and ducking the matter of what he said Oxburgh would do and what Oxburgh did (or didn't do) - declared that "the science is rather protean".
From: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/protean
Protean - Adjective
1. readily assuming different forms or characters; extremely variable.
2. changeable in shape or form, as an amoeba.
No wonder they're having difficulty convincing us that the science is "settled"!
Mind you, the more I think about it, the more "protean" seems to be a rather apt description of "climate science" ... it certainly would allow for unique definitions of otherwise common words, such as ... oh, I dunno ..."trick" perhaps?!