UPDATE: it seems that Mr. Ward doesn’t confine his accusations of dishonesty to concerned members of the public like Donna Laframboise, he’s going after Dr. Richard Tol as well, complaining to journal editors about Tol’s publications made years ago – see update below.
It seems the irascible Bob Ward from the Grantham Institute just couldn’t handle having climate skeptics allowed to give an opinion before the UK Parliament, so he filed rebuttals to every witness. I’ve been sitting on this over a week, and Donna Laframboise reports that the cat is out of the bag now, along with the skeptic response to Bob Ward, who she labels a “rat-snake” for his intolerance.
Parliament has just published the point-counterpoints, and Donna has let loose with a video response.
- Bob Ward, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment | PDF version (
79 KB) 
IPC0060 | Ordered to be published 04 Mar 2014 - Richard Lindzen – written evidence | PDF version (49 KB) IPC0068 | Ordered to be published 04 Mar 2014
- Nicholas Lewis – written evidence | PDF version (115 KB) IPC0069 | Ordered to be published 04 Mar 2014
- Donna Laframboise – written evidence | PDF version (73 KB) IPC0071 | Ordered to be published 04 Mar 2014
Source of Links above: http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/commons-select/energy-and-climate-change-committee/inquiries/parliament-2010/the-ipcc/?type=Written#pnlPublicationFilter
Here’s Donna’s video response:
and her blog post about this matter:
Bob Ward says I uttered a “a number of inaccurate and misleading statements” when I appeared before a UK parliamentary committee in January 2014. His accusations have no basis in fact.
http://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2014/03/05/rat-snake-bob/
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UPDATE: From Dr. Richard Tol’s website, we have this.
Nick Stern’s attack dog PR person, Bob Ward, has reached a new level of trolling. He seems to have taking it on himself to write to every editor of every journal I have ever published in, complaining about imaginary errors even if I had previously explained to him that these alleged mistakes in fact reflect his misunderstanding and lack of education.
Unfortunately, academic duty implies that every accusation is followed by an audit. Sometimes an error is found, although rarely by Mr Ward.
Here is an example. The left figure was in the Final Government Review Draft of IPCC WG2 AR5. The right figure will be in the published report. Spot the difference?
For all the millions of research pounds at Nick Stern’s disposal, the impact is, well, minimal.
=================================================================
Andrew Montford comments at Bishop Hill that:
Bob’s main problem is that he has only one card to play, namely to accuse his opponents of dishonesty, usually at the top of his voice. In this case, he has accused no less than three people: Nic Lewis, Donna Laframboise and Richard Lindzen.
…
The committee are going to find themselves thinking that he is a bit of a wally. Or a lot of a wally.
See: Whole lotta wally
Keep up the good work Donna.. don’t let the occasional snake bite bother you!
I stand corrected. I always thought he was a snake-weasel-rat.
I had to order Donna’s book “Delinquent Teenager” from a major Canadian bookstore. They hadn’t heard of it. I persisted and received a copy, at great expense. It was worth every penny. So it is a pleasure to view this video and hear Donna rebut Bob so well!
What is apparently evolving in the apologists for the IPCC’s fake fizzicks is a reckless disregard for the truth.
Ward appears to be a master dissembler who may go far in that art form for which any connection with the truth may only be accidental.
Perhaps he should be required to place a more prominent warning on his output, such as ‘ These are the ramblings of a seriously disturbed individual committed to proselytising official untruths’.
A bit unfair to rat snakes to compare them to as despicable a creature as Bob Ward. You might attract ire of WWF!
I sympathise with Donna’s case, but I don’t think childish name-calling helps either side one bit.
Some blondes are pretty smart.
It’s the apparently fluffy cuddy creatures you have to beware of …
Pointman
I don’t have much time for Bob Ward but on this occasion he seems to have a point. On Donna’s site she refers readers to the relevant part of the IAC report as she sees it. What it actuallly says is: “This chapter identifies and recommends ways to address the most significant shortcomings in each major step of IPCC’s assessment process”. She then highlights the section of the sentence beginning with the word significant. She is free to do this but she is not free to then reinterpret the sentence to mean “There are significant shortcomings in each major step of IPCC’s assessment process” – the sentence in quotes just does not mean this.
Ok, the problem I have with her video is this:
She excised the word most from most significant.
The most significant shortcoming isn’t necessarily significant on an absolute scale; it may be just the most severe out of a list of relatively minor shortcomings. Being a simulation developer and analyst myself, as well as an algorithm developer, I have personally had some of my most significant shortcomings be merely bits of code that are inelegant, non-reuseable or just plain not quite what I intended.
Example: I have mechanized a free-azimuth navigator and now think we’d be better served by a wander-azimuth navigator. It’s a fix that would not improve the quality of the solution, but it would make life easier during e.g. ground operations.
I’ve got a lot of time for Donna. I’ve read her book on the IPCC and I watched the committee meeting and flinched with her over the juvenile and rude attack on her by MP Robertson. My guess is that he was probably acting as Ward’s attack dog.
Donna says that Ward wrote to committee a letter that was considered ‘Peer Reviewed’:
What kind of person uses the imprimatur of so many institutional logos to give his letter authority yet weasels out of any claim against them with his disclaimer? A BULLY.
If Ward had any cohones he would write up the details as to why he thinks the way he does – but he hasn’t, and he can’t.
All the best Donna.
sc. Perhaps, after you have picked fly sh*t out of the black pepper, you can regale us with your glowing assessment of the IPCC and all the greatness they promote. There ARE significant shortcomings in each major step of IPCC’s assessment process, and your little segway really doesn’t change that fact. The organization is as corrupt as its promoters.
It amazes me how much time and effort the alarmists waste on “deniers” or skeptics. It’s truly breath taking. I would estimate that 75% to 80% of their time is now dedicated to attacking people who don’t agree with them. If they want to regain the high ground it’s very easy. Start making predictions that actually come true. Explain the processes that created those conditions, allow colleagues to replicate those findings.
The reason skepticism is growing is two fold: one, nothing they ever say comes to be and then they keep changing the goal posts (this doesn’t exactly elicit confidence); two, their behavior against anyone who questions them is downright bizarre and they behave more like cultists than scientists. This latter point seriously undermines their science argument.
I think it’s time real scientists pull the plug on the more radical idiots like Bob Ward who have turned climate science into an outright mockery. Because if they don’t, they risk the possibility that a massive backlash will develop and the people will get rid of the good and the bad.
Responding to sc: It may be that Donna emphasized “significant shortcomings” thus de-emphasizing “the most” part of the sentence, which in my mind implies that there are many more shortcomings than those she is electing to emphasize, in each major step of IPCC’s assessment process…
I think Bob’s problem is that, because he does his lobbying for a living (which is legal), he finds it difficult to believe that sincere and competent people might oppose his views for free.
That they are usually correct is, however, the reason why they can’t be forgiven.
(I’m also one of those people who actually think real snakes are quite beautiful, elegant creatures. I used to keep them. So the comparison doesn’t do it for me. Rats are quite likeable, too, apart from the scaly tails. On the other hand, Madagascan Hissing Cockroaches the size of a small hamster…)
‘Ward, who she labels a “rat-snake” for his intolerance.’
What intolerance?He ‘s not intolerant.He gets paid big bucks to get the message out to the congregation and if someone offered him bigger bucks he would spout the exact opposite and swear blind he never thought anything different and ratsnake is a bit over the top,snake would have been just fine.
…can be found on youtube
Mike Bromley. You are right that there ARE significant shortcomings. And Donna is right about the IAC report and the quotes that she gives on how it was received are telling. But in that case why give Bob Ward an easy way out by quoting a clause of sentence and making it say something that you might wish it said, but that unfortunately it does not. Just saying
We should coin an new phrase for these people “Climate snobs”.
Yes, if you quote a document and leave out a key modifier, thereby completely changing the meaning of the quote, you might be justly described as misleading.
FWIW, the actual quote: “far from being the over-mighty, all-controlling leviathan depicted by some of its opponents, the inquiry shows the IPCC to be an amateurish, ramshackle operation with 10 staff, a part-time boss, and poor public relations skills – struggling with the increasing torrent of scientific studies on the climate, and “sluggish” and inept at responding to publicity and criticism.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7974521/IPCCs-Rajendra-Pachauri-is-damaging-the-world.html
I guess she calls him a rat snake because the 2 animals always conjure up negative images. But I prefer Michael Hart’s comparison. As the other 2, cockroaches have negative connotations. But they are seen more as dung eaters and the hissing variety seems to be exactly what Bob is attempting to do (impotently I might add).
Like many, I watched the ‘rather intimidating’ climate committee review at the time – and again, when it was recently repeated here in the UK on BBC Parliament channel. It is outrageous that Donna, who had volunteered and dedicated her professional time (with her flight funded by a substantial donation plea to us skeptic community) in order to help our UK politicians get a grip on the realities of the CAGW scam, is treated in this way. She certainly will not volunteer again.
To this day I still fail to understand why Christopher Monkton, Christopher Booker, James Delingpole, Nigel Farage or Nigel Lawson were not invited to testify. I would have greatly enjoyed listening to them trounce the bully-boy chairmanship of Tim Yeo.
Great video Donna.
It’s about time we had a ‘Not a lot of people know that actually there’s hardly any man-made CO2 up there in the sky’ conference. Let’s make Thursday 13th March (next week) a worldwide ‘Let off the nearest CO2 fire extinguisher day’ – just so we can all prove once and for all how much difference it won’t make to the weather. Go on – I’m up for it. Say 3.00pm GMT. Who’s game?
The spiral tightens, that this public relations flunky, would go to such idiotic lengths to attempt to discredit parliamentary committee witnesses, indicates panic.
Bob Wards problem is simple, he has a record of being willing to twist, torque and spin the english language to promote his bank account.
A Shill.
Once you establish your willingness to deceive for profit, your ability to criticize the credibility of others vanishes.
Defending the IPCC is a lost cause.
2500 scientists, the worlds top scientists, only peer reviewed published by this date science,
carefully reviewed.All claims of the IPCC, now established as false.
Har har har.
But we have a consensus.
Like the invaluable services of M.Mann, when Bob Ward accuses a person of dishonest behaviour, he promotes their perception by the public as an honest and ethical human.
The most odious project their ugliness upon all who resist their corruption.
I agree (alas).