The BBC pits six lawyers against one questioning blogger, Tony Newbery of Harmless Sky, who was making an FOI request for the 28 names. In the process, the judge demonstrates he has partisan views on climate change.
Via Dr. Benny Peiser at The GWPF
As expected, the BBC has won its legal battle against blogger Tony Newbery. Newbery wanted the list of “scientific experts” who attended a BBC seminar at which, according to the BBC Trust, they convinced the broadcaster to abandon impartiality and take a firmly warmist position when reporting climate change.
When the Beeb refused to divulge who these people were and who they worked for, Newbery took the corporation to an information tribunal. Now the names and affiliations of the 28 people who decided the Beeb climate stance – acknowledged by the Corporation to include various non-scientists such as NGO people, activists etc – will remain a secret.
…
The other lay judge, former Haringey councillor Narendra Makanji, appears to have strong views on climate-change skeptics, as he tweeted here this year: “Michael Hintze who dines at no 10 is backer of Global Warming Policy Foundation, climate change deniers fronted by Nigel Lawson.” We asked the Information Commissioner’s Office how a lay judge with such partisan views on climate change came to oversee hearings so closely coupled to the subject of climate. Campaigning lay judges would not normally be appointed to sit on such a case, a spokesman noted, and concerns would be legitimate grounds for appeal.
–Andrew Orlowski, The Register, 9 November 2012
Newbery writes about the affair:
Harmless Sky in court – a fair hearing?
Andrew Orlowski of The Register has written a very accurate and fair account of happenings at the Central London Civil Justice Centre last Monday. This was the first day’s hearing of my appeal against the Information Commissioner’s decision that the BBC were correct to refuse a request for the names of the ‘best scientific experts’ who attended their seminar entitled ‘Climate Change – the Challenge to Broadcasting’ in January 2006. This expert advice was cited on page 40 of the BBC Trust’s excellent report ‘From Seesaw to Wagon Wheel: Safeguarding Impartiality in the 21st Century’ as the authority for a very important editorial decision.
I’ve written about this very strange seminar here and many other times at Harmless Sky.
==============================================================
Bishop Hill writes:
Tony Newbery has lost his FOI claim for the details of the attendees at the BBC’s climate change seminar. The decision was issued in an extraordinarily short period of ten days (it normally takes four weeks).
Andrew Montford has written a 26-page guide to the seminar saga, and the subsequent Freedom of information battle: you can buy it in ebook format here for ~75 cents.
Footnote: Given that the BBC is publicly funded, and has denied public disclosure of the information which by law should be public, this list of 28 won’t likely stay secret very long. In every organization, there’s usually a few people with a conscience. As we’ve seen in Climategate, it only takes one. – Anthony
Here’s a site worth keeping an eye on with regards to the ‘crowd-sourcing’ of information. WUWT comments are quoted frequently.
https://sites.google.com/site/moonrakin/that-bbc-seminar
christopher booker:
re your post at November 11, 2012 at 9:30 am which provides a link to your report entitled ‘The BBC and Climate Change: A Triple Betrayal’ available on the GWPF website at
http://gwpf.w3digital.com/content/uploads/2012/08/Booker-BBC.pdf
Thankyou!
Your report is briillant! I had not seen it before and I commend everyone to read it.
Richard
Our wishes may come true.
When CAGW falls people will lose trust – again – then there will be more inquires.
In Norway it is simpler. The NrK is our public channel, explicitely modelled after the BBC, complete with mandatory “NrK-license”. You pay if you own a device capable of receiving TV, simple as that.
Then they don’t bother to call NrK “adverticing free” (it isn’t), no it is consistently referred to as a “free” channel (as opposed to “pay-TV”), even though NrK is by far the most expensive channel, and there’s a law against not paying for it.
And yes, it is full of CAGW scares and other objective information. I stopped watching its “news” a few years ago. I don’t appreciate being taken for an idiot.
The Oz equivalent of the BBC is the ABC and also has extreme bias in favour of CAGW. I’ve made 13 formal complaints mainly about the so-called “The Science Show” on radio. To give you some idea how bad it is as far as CAGW is concerned, the show’s host Robyn Williams is sometimes also affectionately known as “hundred metres Williams” following his assertion a year or two ago that sea levels could rise by 100 m by the end of the century. (although he is no longer eager to repeat it following certain comments he recieved).
ALL my complaints have been rejected by the “complaints department” (A&CA) cherrypicking parts of the ABC editorial policies and applying subjective weightings to their interpretations. (and ignoring other editorial policies and despite defying their statutory duties of impartiality by act of parliament etc).
My latest complaint identified 29 Science Show stories which were aired over the last year to August which were alarmist towards climate change whereas there was nothing balancing this. In reply A&CA did identify some items in news and current affairs claiming to provide balance but when examined they were largely rather soft and spread over somewhat prior times, as many as seven years before, which I pointed out was not fair. I also pointed out that “The Science Show” itself should report the science in a balanced way, and gave some missing examples such as with the plateau in global temperatures etc, but no go. A&CA claims to be an “independent” department but it answers through the ABC director of editorial policies to the editor-in-chief, which I find to be a tad odd.
Oh well, I still have this and another rejection on appeal to the independent government authority ACMA but my first such appeal took about five months and was rejected.
Bloomberg story on the latest–BBC needs radical overhaul:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-11/bbc-needs-radical-overhaul-as-false-tv-report-sees-chief-quit.html
I started a list of confirmed and likely participants “>
4 confirmed
50 candidates who are connected in one way or another.
I wondered how many more sessions there were, quite a few by the looks of it.
http://www.ibt.org.uk/all_documents/dialogue/Real%20World%20Brainstorm%20update%2030Jul08.pdf
Quote from beesaman’s linked pdf:
“Many of the BBC participants were drama and comedy producers, directors and writers. One of the aims of the seminars has been to persuade non factual programme makers to introduce international themes and stories into their programmes. As a result of the Kew seminar, the BBC commissioned Howard Brenton to write a drama on contemporary China. It is now recognised that drama, comedy and entertainment offer ways of reaching new and wider audiences”.
The bizarre links between The BBC, AGW alarmism, Howard Brenton, sexual misconduct, China and Fatty Pang (The Chinese nickname for Chris Patten onetime pisspoor Governor of Hong Kong and now the only visible head of the BBC) are there – funny old world eh?
Bob Fernley-Jones –
i know i should complain, but i take the easy way out and rarely watch or listen to abc any more. in fact, i turned out before i became a CAGW sceptic, on account of the general deterioration of its programs.
11 Nov: Telegraph: Steven Swinford: Threat to Lord Patten as BBC chief gets £1.3m pay-off
Lord Patten, the chairman of the BBC Trust, came under increasing pressure last night as it emerged he approved a £1.32 million severance package for George Entwistle, the former director-general
John Whittingdale, the chairman of the Commons culture, media and sport committee, said licence fee payers would be “surprised” that he was being given so much after such a short tenure, while Philip Davies MP, who also sits on the committee, said it was “yet another reason” Lord Patten should resign…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/9671132/Threat-to-Lord-Patten-as-BBC-chief-gets-1.3m-pay-off.html
as with FCO’s John Ashton who i commented on earlier in this thread, i wonder how FCO/BBC people have outside interests:
UK Parliament: Lord Patten of Barnes
Register of Interests
1: Directorships
Non-executive Director, Russell Reynolds Associates Inc (company research)2: Remunerated employment, office, profession etc.
Member, International Advisory Board of BP (energy)
Adviser, Hutchison Europe (telecomms, property, transport)
Chairman of the BBC Trust
Member, European Advisory Board, Bridgepoint (private equity group)
Member, EDF Stakeholder Advisory Panel (electricity)
Occasional income from writing and speaking engagements
Non-financial interests
Chancellor, Oxford University etc
http://www.parliament.uk/biographies/lords/christopher-patten/28731
Hi Pat,
I understand your feelings, (November 11, 9:11 pm), and I should qualify that I can’t stand to listen to the so-called “Science Show”. Instead I sometimes go to their website and read any transcripts of stories that may appear to be interesting.
Hmm, so Entwistle gets the equivalent of around two million Oz$ for resigning from the BBC after a very short term….. on the surface apparently out of guilt of failure to perform! Really?
Ho hum!
Further to my comment just above:
Could Patten also be looking for a generous separation package too?
Tempting to think of rats deserting a sinking ship maybe?
“reaching new and wider audiences” – bbc’s climate chaos page doesn’t seem to be working, but fortunately this blog has pasted the following:
23 May 2006: PS-Mag: David Attenborough Kicks Off Climate Chaos, 24 May 2006, 9pm, BBC One
By From bbc.co.uk web site
Are We Changing Planet Earth?
Wednesday 24 May, 9pm, BBC One
David Attenborough draws on his life-long insights into our planet and presents his personal take on climate change. Part two follows next week.
Songs of Praise
Sunday 28 May, TBC, BBC One
Sally Magnusson visits an environmental project in Oxford that has made a real difference to the local community, and meets with historian and environmentalist, Martin Palmer.
Test the Nation – Know Your Planet
Sunday 28 May, 8pm, BBC One
Are you aware of climate and environmental issues? We put the country to the test in the popular quiz show.
Can We Save Planet Earth?
Thursday 1 June, 9pm, BBC One
Part two of David Attenborough’s investigation.
Five Disasters Waiting to Happen
Tuesday 6 June, 9pm, BBC Two
We examine five global locations and scenarios: London, Shanghai, Mumbai, Paris and Tuvalu. All have been identified by experts as vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
The Money Programme
Friday 2 June, 7pm, BBC Two
The Money Programme spends a week with a family in Teesdale – the area with the UK’s highest CO2 emissions per capita.
Panorama
Date and time TBC, BBC One
The Bush administration has resisted calls to engage in Kyoto, and has been accused of a systematic campaign of disinformation and harassment against the scientific community – gagging scientists, re-writing major reports, and allowing the oil and coal industries to drive policy. Panorama investigates these claims.
Climate Change shorts
You can also watch eight short documentaries on the affects of Climate Change via the BBC Four website. For legal reasons, these are only available if you are in the UK.
http://www.psychicsahar.com/artman/publish/article_711.shtml
Panorama: Climate chaos: Bush’s climate of Fear was on BBC One on June 6 2006 (links to transcript)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/panorama/5005994.stm
This is a most excellent read , thanks Mr Booker for posting the link.
http://gwpf.w3digital.com/content/uploads/2012/08/Booker-BBC.pdf
The BBC News department has been corrupt since the war. It has been infested with public school Marxists, KGB spies and the like for years. It is the home of lick-spittle communist apologists. You can’t go on being as corrupt as that forever. Eventually the whole lot will spill out like the guts of a battered pinata.
Breaking: Boaden and another exec have been “sidelined”, not exactly fired yet:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/9671540/BBC-crisis-head-of-news-and-deputy-ordered-to-step-aside.html
Boaden has been the hard-liner against all FOI requests, but this probably won’t affect the Beeb’s hard line on most Stalinist causes. In fact I’d expect them to bear down even harder on Carbon, Diversity, Feminism, and the rest of the usual commie crap, after they clear out this “temporary accidental aberration” that lasted 40 years.
Why not just die?
http://news.yahoo.com/bbc-head-says-broadcaster-must-reform-die-001311798.html
This excellent, well written and comprehensive summary from Christopher Booker as to how a once respected organisation (yes, the BBC was once respected) can be mis-directed by ecozealots far beyond the point of balance is as instructive as it is sad.
http://gwpf.w3digital.com/content/uploads/2012/08/Booker-BBC.pdf
The BBC and Penn State–two peas in a pod.
Exactly right, and the BBC has realised how sensitive this subject is.
That’s also why they refuse every opportunity to discuss their assertions on air and refuse to answer any questions from anyone they deem to be hostile to their carbon dioxide religion.
Interestingly, they demand openess and transparency from every organization they deal with yet claim their own activities are private/secret/confidential (take your pick) and therefore excluded from these standards by means of one of the most obscure parts of the Freedom of Information Act.
David Shukman, the BBC’s first science editor, has a BA in Geography from Durham University.
Geography is a fine discipline, but as a qualification for “science editor”?
The BBC is still involved with some good output. I’ve just watched “Richard Hammond’s Miracles of Nature” on a BBC channel. But it was made by Terra Mater Factual Studios and Oxford Scientific Films, “in association with Hamster’s Wheel Productions.”
Hammond is one of the Top Gear people, nicknamed the “hamster”.
Tip for BBC licence payers: stop paying. They have to prove that you are watching live BBC output, or have recorded for later. The TV detector van story is a fairytale. And they have no right to enter your home.
Don’t throw away the TV. Watch what you like, and don’t pay.
Embarrassed to be British……….
The esteemed blogger omnologos has now discovered the names
See
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2012/11/12/bbc-climate-28-revealed.html
It really hasn’t been a good week for the BBC. Ha ha ha……
I see that the full list has now been leaked/made available/obtained somehow. Let the fun commence….
http://omnologos.com/full-list-of-participants-to-the-bbc-cmep-seminar-on-26-january-2006/