Bishop Hill More Black and greenery
The BBC's Richard Black has been getting involved in drafting an environmental call to arms, which goes by the name of the Donostia Declaration:
The Declaration called for RIO+20. It also asked for the summit to make decisions on “Global Governance”, “Global Goals”, “A Global New Green Deal”, “Mobilisation”, “Education For Sustainable Development” and finally for the complete implementation of “Agenda 21″.
Black's Whitewash has the story.
Coming after the BBC accepting free programming from green groups, coming after CMEP and the revelations of the Climategate II emails, this is probably not much of a surprise. But I think it is fair to say that we have to start asking questions about the integrity of the members of the BBC Editorial Standards Board.
Reader Comments (55)
I thought BBC reporters were not allowed to take any part in anything 'political?' Or to push a particular agenda?
What are Richard Black's bosses doing?
Do they care? Or don't they know? They look clueless and incompetent to me.
I complained about the Country File Fracking item sometime ago, the reponse came on Friday.
It was referred to the production team and they thought it was all fair and reasonable. Even before reading the Bishop's comments above, I complained about the fact it was referred to the production team who were always going to think it was a perfect programme.
Does anyone know what is the best way to contact the BBC Trust, is it by actually writing an old fashioned letter?
Sandy Sinclair
I have not known anyone who has ever successfully made a complaint to the BBC including the Trust.
Sandy: Try looking here http://www.mediawatchuk.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=341&Itemid=92
There is no point making a complaint to the BBC, because such complaints are always investigated by the programme makers themselves. Not surprisingly complaints are always found to be unjustified. The Press Complaints Commission is more independent than the BBC and we all know what a toothless tiger that is.
The Marxist revolution is being accelerated.
As you can see at Black’s Whitewash, it’s all a piece of post modern conceptual political art compiled by the fascinating Felix Dodds. A rather dodgy political party and a lot of obscure NGOs add to their prestige by getting their names associated with the BBC. What Richard Black gets out of it is a mystery. The chance to hobnob with Felix Dodds?
As far as I can see, this is BBC participation in an attempt to suborn democracy.
People forget that the organisations we once called "pressure groups" (and now refer to rather less explicitly as "NGO"'s) are all simply attempts by groups of people with strong opinions to get what they want without having to work through the normal processes of elective democracy.
Every decision taken by a government (or transnational institution) on the advice of an NGO is a direct disenfranchisement of other citizens who voices haven't been heard.
The worst UK example I can recall is Milliband E inviting Friends of the Earth Activist (& Eng Lit Grad) Bryony Worthington to draft the Climate Change Act.
What we're really seeing here is a serious attempt at a transnational coup - and this is just another brick in the wall.
RB's contract may include;
You will not allow your outside interests or private activities to interfere with your BBC work or permit any conflict (actual or potential) to arise between your BBC duties and your outside or private interests to affect your ability to carry out your duties effectively or to place the BBC in a position whereby it is brought into disrepute or its reputation for impartiality is likely to be affected (irrespective of whether or not its reputation is actually affected). In case of doubt you should seek the prior written consent of your [manager] before entering into or commencing any additional employment (whether voluntary or otherwise).
"irrespective of whether or not its reputation is actually affected"
Reading that Stakeholder Forum stuff is like wading through the Mumbai sewer system in the middle of a dysentery epidemic.
I've already complained to Auntie about RB pushing the global governance agenda and asked unanswered questions on his blog, although whenever I try to link to BlacksWhitewash, the post is deleted:
Why am I not surprised at the number of times the word "sustainability" appears?
It's moving up the queue as the scam of choice when AGW finally collapses.
Rick Bradford:
I know what you mean, but you need to be careful choosing your images.One of the deliberate ploys of the sustainability / CAGW bandwagon is to give their movement a radical feel, by recruiting the maximum number of third world / feminist partners. Thus attacking them can seem like racism. As I said at blackswhitewash, looking at their group photo, I have the image of Richard Black and Felix Dobbs in pith helmets being carried aloft by grateful natives.
"we have to start asking questions about the integrity of the members of the BBC Editorial Standards Board."
I think it was obvious that their integrity has been questioned for some time.
As an aside: I do wish intelligent people - and thick people too, come to that - would stop referring to this leftist propaganda machine as "Auntie." It makes me shudder whenever I read or hear this self-appointed term of endearment.
Anyhoo, my main comment: The answer is simple: stop paying the license fee. It really is that simple.
I have never bought a television license and never will. Not just because it's a rip-off. Not just because I can't bring myself to fund a socialist brainwashing organisation. But mainly because I resent being ordered to pay for permission from my Government to watch a television set. Just think about that; the very idea that in a so-called free society people are not free to watch a television set in their own homes unless their government permits them to do so. If anyone can provide any justification for this I'm all eyes and ears.
OK so the threat of fines and prison is enough to make anyone nervous about breaking the hallowed law. All you have to do is position your TV where it is not visible from outside. Then ignore any letters from the licensing Gestapo and refuse entry to any BBC Gestapo employee who knocks at your door. I have done this at two addresses now and have found that after two visits (and refusal of entry) they give up. I get a letter about once a year, suggesting that if I use a TV I should buy a license. It goes in the bin.
The BBC Gestapo have no right of entry into your home. They have no magical devices that can specifically detect a TV receiving broadcasts. The only people who are caught are those who believe in error that they must by law allow entry - but the BBC is wholly reliant on this fear and ignorance. You're safe! So just do it! Sorry for the long rant, but I'm passionate about this - if you hadn't guessed.
@David, UK
too many years of referring to the BEEB as the offensive word I'm afraid. I know a few more offensive words to describe the BBC, but it's Sunday and I'm not sure the Bishop would approve.
I too refuse to pay the license fee, although I live in Prague so much easier for me.
I do miss some BBC programmes though, but no TV and no iplayer in this area, so no choice
Can't blame Black. He is simply trying to ensure that his pension is secure.
BBC Pension fund is heavily into renewables.
Isn't the BBC Pension fund administered by Goldman Sachs amongst others - you kow, the same people pushing the now defunct CCX with Al Gore
Mike Jackson is spot on. Sustainability is going to replace global warming eventually. Which decent person is going to argue against it? - and hey it encompasses everything!
I have sympathy with the view that complaining to the BBC and/or Trust does not achieve much, but not complaining achieves even less. If challenged on a particular subject the BBC can produce the complaints figures. If these are very low, they can dismiss the challenge. If the figures are huge, they may feel less complacent. The internet is surely a good media for drumming up complaints when these are justified.
What a disgrace. Promoting a world government is not evidently within the proper domain of the BBC.
I live across the pond so they cannot try to compel me to pay their license fee, but I would never, ever consent to do so.
C'mon UK cousins, rise up and throw off the BBC shackles!
Fwiw, I have lived happily without live TV at home for quite a few years now. I recommend it as a way to focus more upon reading and other more worthwhile activities. If you cannot live without sports or breaking newscasts there is always the local pub....
Occupy Broadcasting House?
David UK
Auntie she is and auntie she stays, if only to annoy those who think that not paying your round is a radical act and that“Gestapo” and “socialist” are equivalent.
Where’s Little Weed when you need her?
I think we've looked at the BBC's pension fund on here, IIRC, it's full of fossil fuels, rather than renewables!
Jennifer Marohasy today highlights the same problem with the ABC in Australia with this link:
http://www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au/publications/the-sydney-institute-quarterly/
Sorry, you need a more exact reference:
“YES, DIRECTOR” – AN ANTHROPOLOGIST ON THE BOARD OF THE ABC by Ron Brunton in The Sydney Institute Quarterly number 33, August 2008
Do you think Mr Black thinks he is important?
I can think of only a few people who are that important their names live on beyond their mortal lives. And the ones that count are people who told the truth and were against violence. Jesus is the one that immediately springs to mind; 2000 years and still going strong. Mr Black, you are but mortal and count for very little in the scheme of things.
Is promoting “Global Governance” just one step away from Treason?
If the periodic reports that the BBC pension funds are heavily invested are correct then this should not be a surprise which begs the question, Are the BBC pension funds heavily invested in green funds? Does anyone have confirmation one way or the other?
Looks like as the latest Forbush decrease has confirmed the Svensmark’s hypothesis.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/Ap-Cl.htm
THE BBC IS VERY BIG ON RECYCLING
The failed act from Xfactor and Old episodes of Britains Got Talent and old members (sounds rude ) of old Boybands have all turned up on The Voice
And as a member of the BARB research panel i have made my own little stand against BBC Political Bias i logged myself into the set top box and watched Britains Got Talent all the way through ( but it wasnt as good as last week )
I havent watched The Voice yet as i get in late from work
But a mate reckons its really good
So I might watch it on the IPlayer
Talking about check out the first item about Energy production with Peter lillee on last thursdays Newsnight with the delightfull Emily Maitless
The BBC and to some extent all of the Greens and warmist movement which includes the MET office live in a world of make-believe. They actually chose ignorance of the facts. The Hockey stick which was thoroughly trounced by your book and the two M&M 's is still valid in their eyes. Try to get one of them to denounce it. The same goes for global warming in the last seventeen years where the evidence says no warming they enter their world of make believe. The fact that CO2 follows warming by being released from the oceans does not compete with their make believe. The fact that the oceans of the world are nearer to caustic soda and cannot possibly be the other side of pure water towards acid if it took in all the atmospheric CO2 is way beyond their comprehension. Their state of make believe is a hard one to penetrate for their mind set is that CO2 is going to cause CGW and it is already happening regardless of any empirical evidence to the contrary, their whole livelihoods and status depends on this make believe.
@RayG
Soem surprises on the BBC's Pensions investments:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mypension/sites/helpadvice/pages/top-100-investments.shtml
Seems odd when you consider this:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/mypension/sites/helpadvice/pages/responsible-investment.shtml
If you re going to have a go at the BBC wait till this RIO 20 turns up on BBC news
Then complain about it to Ray Snoody ( funny name but seems a fair bloke ) who host a complaints about BBC News programme On BBC News 24 on a Saturday morning just before Click with Spencer Kelly comes on.
Interesting to see who the BBC's pension funds invested in, the top 6, are well-known, no 7 is a Chinese internet search engine! It's only when you get to No 58, when a green energy firm appears.
They're definitely not putting their money where their mouth is!
Apr 1, 2012 at 11:02 AM | rickbradford
"... like wading through the Mumbai sewer system in the middle of a dysentery epidemic."
Thanks, Rick, for painting that picture...
"... like wading through the Mumbai sewer system in the middle of a dysentery epidemic."
Splendid metaphor, Rick - I got the picture - unfortunately too 'brightly';)
Richard Black, who is this weasel? He is a lowly media hack for goodness sake now morphing before our eyes into some crank conspirator with a messiah complex [aren't they all - yawn].
I do believe this messianic thing, the quasi-religious and very superstitious mind funk of some mystical quest for a green grail and the 'greater glory' of the preservation of Mother EARTH [read - high priests = E Mann, Hansen, Gore, Krugman, Huhne].
Well it has all rather gone to Mr. Blacks head - as the desperation of the alarmists becomes more and more acute - acolytes of the high priests scuttle off [screaming alack and woe] and have commenced their own forms of petty rituals to appease the Gods of Sustainability - now, does that make Black a heretic or a visionary. It happened to the Mayan's, a nice irony that the final chapter may well be played out in that 'neck of the woods'.
I think that Black is a deluded eejit, who ought to grow up and realise his lowly station in life - bbc hack and NOT saviour of the planet [maybe therapy and counselling would help].
The problem with all you witty, clever and erudite fellows is that you don't understand the Marxist, Trotskyist cabal you are up against. This in the end will be your funeral. Your opponents know this and throw you the occasional bone. Like inviting the Bishop to some parley at the MET.
Since climate change and its associated corollaries have nothing to do with science, nor climate, nor understanding, you will have to learn how to deal with people who don't obey the rules of the Marquise of Queensberry.
john in cheshire:
"the ones that count are people who told the truth and were against violence. Jesus is the one that immediately springs to mind"
Yes, thankfully we have that uber accurate book, the bible, that tells us who Jesus was and what his views were.
Meanwhile, back in sceptic land...
Schrodinger's cat,
I agree. It has to be better to make the effort to complain. While the BBC may appear to ignore you and send bland dismissive replies, they have an overall effect. If your arguments are good, you may also have an effect at the personal level of the people who see it. Also, they cannot just ignore you. If you receive an unsatisfactory answer, don't accept it, take it to the next level .... and the next, which is likely appealing your complaint to the Trust. You still won't get a straight answer, but you are making more people see your argument. You've gotta have stamina though!
Schrodinger's cat,
I agree. It has to be better to make the effort to complain. While the BBC may appear to ignore you and send bland dismissive replies, they have an overall effect. If your arguments are good, you may also have an effect at the personal level of the people who see it. Also, they cannot just ignore you. If you receive an unsatisfactory answer, don't accept it, take it to the next level .... and the next, which is likely appealing your complaint to the Trust. You still won't get a straight answer, but you are making more people see your argument. You've gotta have stamina though!
I worry about the sustainability of common sense - I think it's fast evaproating at the hands of these loonys-on-a-mission. You think the Thirds Reich was bad? You ain't seen nothing, yet.
Athelstan
So do I, and we won’t make it go away by yawning at it.Politicians haven’t a clue where they’re taking us, and are happy to leave the boring business of formulating policy up to the Felix Dodds of this world. Just google him, and see what kind of people are writing the script for our actor-leaders to read out at their summits. They’re not Marxists. They’re self-important loonies, filling the gap left by the collapse of principled political mass movements, whether marxist, social democrat, or conservative.
Athelstan and Jimmy Haigh
I said it before to rickbradford. Let’s say it more brutally. Mumbai shit is no different to any other. You’re just creating an easy target for Black and Dodds and their phony multi-ethnic alliance to attack.
Adam Gallon,
"I think we've looked at the BBC's pension fund on here, IIRC, it's full of fossil fuels, rather than renewables!"
Yes, but it wasn't examined in a blog post by BH himself. It was a comment by Brownedoff in the threads last year. Brownedoff said:
This is 'somewhat credible' because although it is the only one I know of that actually gives the names and numbers on where BBC pension fund goes, it does not provide a link or a reference to the source.
Almost every other comment that I've read on BH regarding BBC pension fund (searching 'BBC pension fund' on BH shows 83 hits) repeats the assertion that the fund is heavily invested in the renewable energy industry without attempting to substantiate it with names and numbers.
What does it take to submit an FOI to find the truth, if the info isn't already publicly available? It is high time that this myth is either confirmed or refuted.
The renewables and carbon are in hedge funds and investment trusts.
Google those names to look for their special investment areas.
Hmm looking at the list the BBC is still heavily invested in companies that fund the green wash! Oil companies in particular love the regulation of the market that the greenish cult buy them !
The BBC pension scheme top 100 investments: http://www.bbc.co.uk/mypension/sites/helpadvice/pages/top-100-investments.shtml
OK. Do we now have consensus that the myth that BBC is heavily invested in renewables schemes is thoroughly debunked? Who is writing up the rebuttal? :D
Here is another BBC link I found when looking for pension information:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/foi/publication_scheme/classes/disclosure_logs/
It has nothing to do with the subject of this post but there is a lot of interesting information buried in there.
@ geoffchambers
"You’re just creating an easy target for Black and Dodds and their phony multi-ethnic alliance to attack."
I will never fear Black, he is a clown, the people in the background who use such mouthpieces [useful idiots] like Black they are the real enemy and yes they do play 'hardball' - this war [against the 'green agenda'] is no joke and if I give that impression, then I apologise.
But, dark humour has a part to play to bring over to our way of thinking - the fence sitters.
Athelstan
Yes, Black is a clown.
But he is a DANGEROUS clown. He has the airwaves - we don't.
I just sent this to Ray Snoddy, presenter of BBC's NewsWatch - but with little hope that anything will happen. NewsWatch often seems to me to be flaccid - the format is "Complainer says his piece, often stumbling, BBC smoothie whitewashes the whole thing, Ray Snoddy nods sagely and moves on to the next item" I have NEVER seen Mr Snoddy really pitching in to the BBC. Monopoly broadcaster - with a sinecure "Watcher".
Time was, Ray was fairly sharp when he was at the FT. But even in those days, he swung with the fat cats like the BBC, the ITV companies and the Government line. At the time I dealt with him - he was proven wrong on the whole direction of the start of satellite TV in the UK. WE knedw that Murdoch was poised to sweep the field, Ray always hedged his bets, never predicted that the established UK broadcasters were headed for failure. IMHOI Ray Snoddy NEVER dug into the real detail, technical or commercial. It was a hot issue at the time - and he got it wrong. Result - Murdoch's Sky is one of the biggest businesses in Britain, the established broadcasters list scores of millions.
This is what I sent to Mr Snoddy. I doubt if he will reply.
.................
Hi Ray I hope you are as well as I am. You may remember me from Britsat days ? We were right techically- Sky TV flew the satellite were were pushing (RCA 4000) but out of Luxembourg.
Please do a track-back on Richard Black at the Bishop-hill.net site. They guy is a total disgrace to journalism and the BBC. And I speak as an M.Sc.
I am posting a copy of this at the Bish site. Black is also regularly lampooned at WattsUpWithThat.com - the world's No 1 science website.