A key moment in developing the new party line was a “high-level seminar” in 2006, attended by a bevy of top BBC executives. It was organised by Roger Harrabin, one of its senior environmental correspondents, and Dr Joe Smith, a geographer and climate activist from the Open University. They had set up the Cambridge Media and Environment Programme to promote the consensus line on global warming, funded by, among others, the Department for the Environment (then in charge of government policy on climate change) and WWF, one of the leading warmist pressure groups.

For a long time the BBC was remarkably coy about what had transpired at this gathering, but gradually – aided by the Freedom of Information Act – the details were dug out by two diligent bloggers, Tony Newbery of Harmless Sky and Andrew Montford of Bishop Hill. Their submission on it was, however, brushed aside in that dotty BBC Trust report last summer, where Prof Steve Jones recommended that the BBC’s coverage of climate issues should show not less bias but more.