It’s the story many hacks and sceptics have been waiting for: to shoot down Al Gore’s Oscar-winning film, An Inconvenient Truth. Last night, the BBC’s flagship news programme, the Ten O’Clock news, led with the story that a British High Court Judge had ruled that Gore’s film had made “alarmist” and “exaggerated” claims.

Sadly, BBC seems to have failed in examining the source of those claims.

As the trailers finished the BBC’s Anchorman Huw Edwards said: “A controversial film on climate change being shown in British schools is heavily criticized by a high court judge for making alarmist and exaggerated claims”.

The overriding theme of the piece, by the BBC’s environmental analyst Roger Harrabin, was that Gore’s film was flawed with nine significant errors. The judge had pointed out it was “a political film.”

However what the BBC spectacularly failed to do in its programme last night was give any background to the “political” nature of the attack against the film. The BBC reported that the fact the High Court case against the film was brought by Stewart Dimmock, a “school governor in Kent” who called the film a “political shockumentary”.

The BBC did not mention Dimmock’s own political connections: Dimmock is a member of the political group, the New Party. The founder and chair of the New Party is Robert Durward, whose party is so right-wing it has been labeled “fascist” by the Scottish Tories.

More importantly, there is a cross-fertilisation between the New Party and Durward’s other pet project – he is the founder of the anti-environmental Scientific Alliance. Both the New Party and Scientific Alliance work closely with the PR company Foresight Communications.

The Alliance is one of the leading sceptic organizations in the UK, that campaigns against climate change, against Al Gore’s film and promotes the heavily criticized alternative film “Great Global Warming Swindle”.

It has also forged links with skeptics in the US. For example in 2005, the Alliance held a conference on Climate Change called “Apocalypse No: Assessing Catastrophic Climate Change.”

Leading climate skeptics such as Richard Lindzen, Fred Singer Nils-Axel Morner and Benny Peiser spoke. The keynote speaker was David Bellamy, the British naturalist, who believes climate change is “poppycock”. At the time the Alliance’s Scientific Advisory Forum also included Sallie Baliunas, one of the world’s leading climate sceptics.

Pity the BBC failed to inform viewers of the political nature of this attack..

7 Comments

  • AS far as I can make out, the judge actually ignored most of what Dimmock said, and instead compared the film to the IPCC.

    “Mr Downes produced a long schedule of such alleged errors or exaggerations and waxed lyrical in that regard. It was obviously helpful for me to look at the film with his critique in hand.

    In the event I was persuaded that only some of them were sufficiently persuasive to be relevant for the purposes of his argument, and it was those matters – 9 in all – upon which I invited Mr Chamberlain to concentrate. It was essential to appreciate that the hearing before me did not relate to an analysis of the scientific questions, but to an assessment of whether the ‘errors’ in question, set out in the context of a political film, informed the argument on ss406 and 407. All these 9 ‘errors’ that I now address are not put in the context of the evidence of Professor Carter and the Claimant’s case, but by reference to the IPCC report and the evidence of Dr Stott.”

    http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2007/2288.html

  • While the court’s ruling is based on an appraisal of the science in St. Gore’s film, our author here is apprasing by means of ad hominem guilt-by-association.

    For those concerned with truth, it is: no one in their right mind believes they can possibly know the truth about so complex and unknowable a subject as the climate of the entire earth for thousands of years. Misanthropic socialists (do I repeat myself?) love global warming hysteria because they can shame and villify the entire human race while demanding control over the entire earth to “save” it. Remember who Al Gore is: A socialist control freak who used to conspire with Willy Clinton and his hell-bitch wife to control every body, every body’s child, every body’s property, and every body’s mind. Al Gore wants to rule the earth. The earth is broken, you see, and needs Al to fix it. Be afraid, as the jargon-mongers like to say, be very afraid.

  • John, I’m not sure that “ad hominem” means what you think it means… or perhaps you’re just completely unaware of your own glaring hypocrisy 🙂

    Keep up the good work Andy. Annoying all the right people.

  • Heh heh… I think Nelson has a point here. For the benefit of anyone in the dark on this one, “ad hominem” refers to a style of debate in which a participant attempts to win by name-calling. Mr. Howard above, for example, has made a number of ad hominem attacks in his comment (it is left to the reader to decide whether he advances his position by doing so).

    I’d particularly like to disabuse Mr. Howard of the notion that Al Gore is a socialist (or, worse still, that Bill Clinton is one by association). Gore and Clinton are flag-bearers for the Democratic Party, who are essentially conservative (on foreign intervention and hawkish policy, on big business, on healthcare, on law and order, on privatisation, and so forth). It’s admittedly true that you get a *slightly* more moderate perspective on *some* things from the Democrats – it’s essentially right-wing without significant Christian-fundamentalist fervour.

    On another topic: I’ve surfed in from Media Lens, and they’re making some good waves on this one too. Good work!

  • Yeah, although “John” maybe a little more extreme than the Oz prime minister – he did have a point though : and that’s, that no matter whether you are of the right, left, or middle ground (now where’s that at ?), these things always end up being about CONTROL and the gravitation towards the making of money – it’s in the nature of the human beast. You just can’t get away it !

  • Sorry all, it appears looking back at the very end of post, I missed putting a “from” before the “it” .
    Anyway it might serve to bring more attention to it…ha, ha…we must try to remain positive in such a negative world !

    Mr “Howard” had another point, and that’s the TRUTH – how can anyone puport to know the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth particularly in religion or politics ? It’s all a matter of degree, applying logic, and as the court and we might try to do … “on the balance of probabilities”.

    Sure Mr Gore’s film might have in/advertently uttered some inconvenient untruths of its own, but you have to look at the bigger picture and apply the preceding paragraph to the whole scene.

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