Monthly Archives: August 2024

Kemi Badenoch Accepts £10,000 From Chair of Tufton Street Climate Denial Group

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Original article by Adam Barnett and Sam Bright republished from DeSmog.

Conservative MP Kemi Badenoch. Credit: Credit: HM Treasury (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

The former business secretary, who is running for Conservative Party leader, has defended net zero U-turns and backed new fossil fuel drilling.

Conservative Party leadership hopeful Kemi Badenoch received £10,000 towards her campaign from the chair of a climate science denial group, DeSmog can reveal. 

Neil Record, a millionaire Tory donor and founder of the investment firm Record Financial Group, is chair of Net Zero Watch (NZW), the campaign arm of the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF). 

Based in 55 Tufton Street, Westminster, the GWPF is the UK’s leading climate science denial group. The GWPF’s director Benny Peiser has suggested it would be “extraordinary anyone should think there is a climate crisis”, while the group has also expressed the view that carbon dioxide has been mis-characterised as pollution, when in fact it is a “benefit to the planet”. 

Its NZW arm has called for “rapid” new North Sea oil and gas exploration, and for wind and solar power to be “wound down completely”. 

Badenoch received £10,000 from Record in July, according to her official register of interests, which said that the donation was “in support of my campaign for the leadership of the Conservative Party”. 

The North West Essex MP has previously criticised the UK’s climate targets, calling them “arbitrary” in a 2022 interview. Badenoch has previously suggested that she would be in favour of delaying the UK’s commitment to reach net zero by 2050. 

While serving as business secretary in September 2023, Badenoch also defended the decision by then prime minister Rishi Sunak to water down and delay a number of net zero policies, and argued that new fossil fuel licences were compatible with the UK’s climate targets.

“It’s no wonder that the Conservatives don’t want to act on the climate crisis when they are receiving donations from the people running groups like Net Zero Watch,” Adrian Ramsay, co-leader of the Green Party, told DeSmog. 

“Just weeks on from the worst electoral defeat in their entire history, you’d hope they would be reflecting on why policies like U-turning on their climate commitments were so unpopular. Instead, it seems they are going to double down on their hostility to net zero and will remain both a threat to the planet and completely out of touch with the British public.”

Polling by More in Common and E3G during the 2024 general election period found that a majority of people in every UK constituency are worried about climate change. Some 61 percent of 2024 Conservative voters said they are worried about climate change, matched by 76 percent of Labour voters, and 65 percent of the country overall. 

Last month, which saw world temperatures reach their hottest levels ever measured, Record wrote in The Telegraph that it is “debatable in detail” whether burning fossil fuels increases carbon dioxide (CO2) and causes dangerous global warming.

He went on to claim that achieving net zero by 2050 “will restrict our freedom, and is likely to be eye-wateringly expensive”, and should be replaced with the “realistic promise” for the UK not to contribute more than one percent of global emissions. 

The world’s foremost climate science body, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has stated that CO2 “is responsible for most of global warming” since the late 19th century, which has increased the “severity and frequency of weather and climate extremes, like heatwaves, heavy rains, and drought”.

The IPCC has also warned that climate action has been delayed by “rhetoric and misinformation that undermines climate science and disregards risk and urgency”.

Record is a “life vice president” of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) think tank, which he chaired until July 2023. The IEA has opposed state-led climate policies and has advocated for more fossil fuel extraction. The think tank received funding from the oil giant BP every year from 1967 to at least 2018. Record has given money to both the IEA and the GWPF. 

The GWPF and the IEA are part of the Tufton Street network of think tanks and lobbying groups based in Westminster, all of which campaign for less government regulation, including on climate change.

When questioned previously about his GWPF donations, Record said: “I personally regard the continuing contribution of the GWPF to the climate change debate as very positive in assisting balance and rationality in this contentious area.”

The GWPF and the Tories

A number of other Tory MPs have also recently received donations from funders of the GWPF. 

One of the early funders of the GWPF, Lord Michael Hintze, donated £18,000 to a number of Tory MPs from May to August. A hedge fund manager, Conservative peer and major party donor, Lord Hintze has said that he believes “there is climate change” caused “in part due to human activity over the past century”. However, he has said that “all sides must be heard” on the issue “to reach the right conclusion for society as a whole”.

A number of climate consensus studies conducted between 2004 and 2015 found that between 90 percent and 100 percent of experts agree that humans are responsible for climate change. A study published in 2021, which reviewed over 3,000 scientific papers, found that over 99 percent of climate science literature says that global warming is caused by human activity.

Lord Hintze’s recent donations included £2,000 to Claire Coutinho, £5,000 to Iain Duncan Smith, £2,500 to Alison Griffiths, £2,500 to Kit Malthouse, £2,000 to Andrew Murrison, £2,500 to Patrick Spencer, and £2,500 to Nick Timothy.

Former energy and net zero secretary Coutinho – who oversaw the weakening of a number of flagship climate policies – received another £2,000 from Lord Hintze in January. 

Lord Hintze is one of the Conservative Party’s most prolific donors in recent years and has given more than £4 million to the party and its candidates since 2002. 

Between the 2019 general election and the start of the 2024 campaign, the Conservatives received £8.4 million from fossil fuel interests, highly polluting industries, and climate science deniers.

GWPF donor Lord Jon Moynihan has also given £12,000 to a number of Tory MPs in recent months, including £5,000 to Peter Fortune, £2,000 to Mark Francois, and £5,000 to Thomas Bradley. He has now donated more than £600,000 to the Conservatives and its candidates since 2001.

Lord Moynihan gave £25,000 to the GWPF between 2018 and 2023, and has donated over £300,000 to other “free market” groups in the Tufton Street network in recent years, including the IEA. 

Lord Moynihan also has substantial oil and gas investments. The peer’s register of interests shows that he holds shares worth more than £100,000 in each of the oil and gas majors BP, Shell, and TotalEnergies.

The GWPF and NZW have a number of political ties. Labour MP Graham Stringer is a director of the GWFP, having joined its board of trustees in 2015. Lord David Frost, a Tory peer and the UK’s former chief Brexit negotiator, is a trustee of the organisation alongside Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson. Former Tory MP Andrea Jenkyns, who lost her seat in July’s general election, is a director of NZW.

“The government may have changed, but it’s not clear much else has when it comes to climate crisis denialism,” Jolyon Maugham, executive director of the Good Law Project, told DeSmog. “Labour MP Graham Stringer continues to sit on the board of the GWPF and Neil Record, who chairs its subsidiary, is funding the would-be Tory leader Kemi Badenoch.”

Following a review by the Charity Commission into the GWPF’s activities and structure, the group announced that it would soon be ending its formal ownership of NZW.

All the MPs and donors mentioned in this article were approached for comment. 

Original article by Adam Barnett and Sam Bright republished from DeSmog.

Continue ReadingKemi Badenoch Accepts £10,000 From Chair of Tufton Street Climate Denial Group

Net Zero Scrutiny Group Chair Urged Not to Resurrect ‘Failed’ Project

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Original article by Adam Barnett and Sam Bright republished from DeSmog.

Former Tory MP Craig Mackinlay, chair of the Net Zero Scrutiny Group. Credit: GB News / YouTube

Despite growing public support for climate action, former Tory MP Craig Mackinlay has pledged to continue opposing green policies.

Campaigners and politicians have warned a former Conservative MP against reviving an anti-net zero group which is allied to climate science denial. 

Craig Mackinlay stepped down as MP for South Thanet before the general election after contracting sepsis in September. Tributes were paid in Parliament to Mackinlay’s personal courage in May after the illness required the amputation of his legs and arms.

Mackinlay was nominated to the House of Lords on 4 July (the day of the election) by outgoing prime minister Rishi Sunak, and Mackinlay said he would use this position to campaign around sepsis and limb loss, “as well as sensible net zero”.

In an interview last week with GB News – a broadcaster which frequently airs climate science denial and attacks on net zero – Mackinlay announced that he plans to continue to chair the Net Zero Scrutiny Group (NZSG), which he has led since its launch in 2021.

“The Net Zero Scrutiny Group will continue”, he said. “We had a number of peers in it before. 

“I intend it to continue – and perhaps even stand it up with some external funding – if we can fund it as a proper group, to actually tell the story to new parliamentarians about why the current thinking is so woolly and so wrong and so costly, and there’s a better way of doing this.”

The NZSG has led the opposition to climate action in Parliament in recent years. The group has urged the government to scrap “environmental levies on domestic energy”, “expand North Sea exploration” for oil and gas, and support “shale gas extraction” by lifting the ban on fracking. 

“Just a month on from the worst electoral defeat in its entire history, you’d think the Conservative Party might be reflecting on why policies that will trash the planet went down so badly,” Zack Polanski, deputy leader of the Green Party, told DeSmog.

“If its remaining MPs decide to double down on their hostility to net zero then it will show that they have learnt absolutely nothing, are completely out of touch with the British public, and represent a threat to life on our planet.”

Public Support for Net Zero

The NZSG has extensive ties to the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), the UK’s main climate science denial group, sharing research and staff, and promoting each other’s work. 

In March 2022, Mackinlay gave a supportive quote to a report by the GWPF’s campaign arm, Net Zero Watch, which called for “rapid” new North Sea exploration and for wind and solar power to be “wound down completely”. 

As recently as May of this year, Mackinlay’s parliamentary aide was still Harry Wilkinson, head of policy at the GWPF, according to the official register of secretaries. 

The GWPF frequently publishes reports that cast doubt on established climate science, explicitly rejecting the position of the world’s climate scientists. It has also actively campaigned against net zero policies, and in favour of new fossil fuel extraction. 

As reported by DeSmog, two thirds (24 out of 37) of the NZSG’s supporters in the House of Commons lost their seats in the general election. The Conservative campaign adopted some of the language and policies of anti-net zero groups, as the party pushed for more fossil fuel extraction and to delay key net zero reforms. 

Between the 2019 general election and the start of the 2024 campaign, the Conservatives received at least £8.4 million in donations from fossil fuel interests, climate science deniers, and polluting industries. 

The Conservative Party won its lowest ever number of seats in July’s election, registering only 121 Commons constituencies, with Mackinlay’s former seat (albeit with reformed boundaries) falling to the Labour Party. 

Sam Hall, director of the Conservative Environment Network, has urged the party’s leadership candidates to learn from Sunak’s mistakes. Writing for CapX on 29 July, he said: “Now in a new Parliament, aspiring Conservative leaders must learn the lessons from the campaign and set out a bold plan to stop climate change and restore nature… 

“Further weakening environmental policies will not shift Reform voters, and will only serve to alienate current Conservative voters and the voters the party needs to win back from Labour, the Lib Dems and the Greens.”

Polling by More in Common and E3G during the general election period found that a majority of people in every UK constituency are worried about climate change. Some 61 percent of 2024 Conservative voters said they are worried about climate change, matched by 76 percent of Labour voters, and 65 percent of the country overall. 

Voters that switched from the Conservatives to Labour were highly engaged on climate issues, with 72 percent saying prior to the election that net zero would affect how they planned to vote.

It also appears that support for climate action has risen since the election. A new poll by YouGov for Climate Barometer, which tracks public opinion on climate change, found that support for net zero had risen from 69 percent in April to 74 percent in July after the election.

“This attempt to deny science and resurrect the failed Net Zero Scrutiny Group is bizarre against a background of the YouGov poll this week which showed that three quarters of the UK public support the drive to net zero,” said Jolyon Maughan, executive director of the Good Law Project. 

The world’s leading climate science body, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has said that climate action has been delayed by “rhetoric and misinformation that undermines climate science and disregards risk and urgency”.

Selwin Hart, the assistant secretary general of the UN, last week warned of a “massive mis- and disinformation campaign” to stop climate action. “There is this prevailing narrative – and a lot of it is being pushed by the fossil fuel industry and their enablers – that climate action is too difficult, it’s too expensive,” he said.  

“It is absolutely critical that leaders, and all of us, push back and explain to people the value of climate action, but also the consequences of climate inaction.”

Mackinlay said he had “nothing to add” when approached by DeSmog for comment.

Original article by Adam Barnett and Sam Bright republished from DeSmog.

Continue ReadingNet Zero Scrutiny Group Chair Urged Not to Resurrect ‘Failed’ Project

Revealed: Shell Oil Nonprofit Donated to Anti-Climate Groups Behind Project 2025

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Original article by Geoff Dembicki republished from DeSmog.

Shell USA Company Foundation has sent hundreds of thousands to Project 2025 advisors. Credit: Marc Rentschler / Unsplash

Foundation says it ‘does not endorse any organizations’ while funneling hundreds of thousands to rightwing causes.

A U.S. foundation associated with oil company Shell has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to religious right and conservative organizations, many of which deny that climate change is a crisis, tax records reveal.

Fourteen of those groups are on the advisory board of Project 2025, a conservative blueprint proposing radical changes to the federal government, including severely limiting the Environmental Protection Agency.

Shell USA Company Foundation sent $544,010 between 2013 and 2022 to organizations that broadly share an agenda of building conservative power, including advocating against LGBTQ+ rights, restricting access to abortions, creating school lesson plans that downplay climate change and drafting a suite of policies aimed at overhauling the federal government.

Donees include the Heartland Institute, a longtime purveyor of climate disinformation, which published a video on YouTube in May stating incorrectly that “the scientific data continue to show there is no climate crisis.” Other groups that have received donations include the American Family Association, which claims that the “climate change agenda is an attack on God’s creation,” as well as the Heritage Foundation, the lead organization behind Project 2025.

“Shell has every reason to want to maintain close relationships with organizations that wield outsize political influence and just happen to reliably support the interests of the fossil fuel industry,” said Adrian Bardon, a professor of philosophy at Wake Forest University who has studied the religious right and climate denialism.

The Shell USA Company Foundation helps employees boost their charitable giving to nonprofits. A Shell USA spokesperson wrote via email that the company’s workers make the initial decision to donate “to non-profit (tax exempt) organizations of their choice.”

According to the company’s online donation portal, Shell will match individual donations up to $7,500. The spokesperson confirmed that the foundation “matches employee gifts to such qualified 501(c)(3) nonprofit agencies,” but did not respond to specific inquiries about which organizations, if any, received matching donations from the foundation.

Tax records from 2022 show that the president of the foundation was Gretchen Watkins, the current president of Shell USA. But the foundation itself “does not endorse any organizations” and “giving is a personal decision not directed by the company,” the spokesperson added.

Shell USA president Gretchen Watkins was also president of the foundation, 2022 tax records show. Credit: OurEnergyPolicy.org / YouTube

Shell is a multinational oil and gas producer headquartered in London that last year reported adjusted earnings of $28.25 billion. Its American subsidiary, Shell USA, has for decades operated Shell USA Company Foundation, which makes grants to American non-profits.

Because the foundation itself is a registered non-profit, it must file public returns each year with the IRS, which contain detailed information about the organizations to which it donates. The vast majority of these non-profits have no explicit political focus. They include YMCAs, youth groups, local churches, schools and mainstream charities such as Oxfam and United Way.

But an analysis by the Guardian and DeSmog found at least 21 groups supported by Shell’s foundation that are aggressively opposed to progressive cultural and economic change, including addressing the crisis of global heating.

“They’re all certainly working in the rightwing policy and propaganda space,” said Peter Montgomery, research director at the progressive non-profit organization People for the American Way. “That includes the anti-regulation corporate right and the culture warriors of the religious right.”

Since 2013, the Shell foundation sent $59,264 to the American Family Association, another Project 2025 adviser and an organization designated as a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center due in part to its long history of aggressive anti-gay activism. In a post from 2022, the conservative Christian organization referred to “the unproven hypothesis of man-made, catastrophic climate change.”

Shell’s foundation contributed $23,321 to the Heritage Foundation, which published the Project 2025 document known as Mandate for Leadership. The conservative thinktank has deep ties to Donald Trump and a long history of attacking the scientific consensus on climate change. Last year, it published a commentary on its website stating that “climate change models are poor predictors of warming.”

Shell’s foundation also donated $58,002 to Alliance Defending Freedom, another Project 2025 adviser. It’s a conservative Christian legal activist group that claims credit for helping overturn Roe v Wade, explaining that its “attorneys and staff were proud to be involved from the very beginning.”

Shell’s foundation also reported donations worth $105,748 to Hillsdale College, a private conservative Christian school in Michigan that’s listed as an advisory board member of Project 2025 and that has hosted prominent climate skeptics.

The American Family Association, the Heritage Foundation, Alliance Defending Freedom and Hillsdale College did not respond to requests for comment.

A Heartland Institute video claims ‘the scientific data continue to show there is no climate crisis.’ Credit: Heartland Institute / YouTube

Other donees associated with Project 2025 include the American Center for Law and Justice ($14,321), the Claremont Institute ($1,975), Discovery Institute ($3,300), the Family Research Council ($3,399), First Liberty Institute ($19,100), the Leadership Institute ($7,125), the Media Research Center ($2,528), Students for Life of America ($1,020), the Heartland Institute ($5,000) and the Texas Public Policy Foundation ($8,275).

The Shell USA Foundation also donated to religious right organizations that aren’t directly involved with Project 2025, including $79,874 to Focus on the Family, an anti-abortion group that’s called climate change “an unproven theory.” When reached for comment, Gary Schneeberger, a spokesperson for the organization, wrote: “We consider it a best practice for our ministry and, in fact, a promise to our donors that we never share information about their donations with anyone.”

Another anti-abortion group called Texas Right to Life, which has previously argued that climate change is “arguably, nonexistent”, received $65,103 from the foundation. A spokesperson for the group wrote in an email that “the gifts that came from Shell were matched gifts from its employees.”

Shell’s foundation also sent $8,541 to the Prager University Foundation, which is associated with the rightwing media outlet PragerU. Known for producing conservative videos targeting young people with messages downplaying the climate crisis, its content has been approved for classrooms in several states.

Other religious right donees include Judicial Watch ($32,894), the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention ($37,420), the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty ($2,100) and the Susan B Anthony List ($5,700).

“In the absence of real transparency, one can only speculate on the motives behind these donations,” Bardon said. But the contributions help Shell maintain its place within a broader conservative coalition, he argued. “So if something comes up that bothers me, it’s going to bother you, too, because we’re on the same team,” he said.

This article is co-published with the Guardian.

Original article by Geoff Dembicki republished from DeSmog.

Continue ReadingRevealed: Shell Oil Nonprofit Donated to Anti-Climate Groups Behind Project 2025

Labour urged to act over 9% rise to energy bills

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/splash-288

ENERGY prices are set to rise by 9 per cent in October, experts revealed today — with the “alarming” increase accompanying winter fuel payment cuts.

A typical household’s energy bills are expected to rise to £1,714 a year, up from £1,568, according to energy consultancy Cornwall Insight.

The group said that while the figure is less than the cap previously predicted, there are also likely to be further “modest increases” in January and more rises early in the year due to “recent tensions in the Russia-Ukraine war.”

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End Fuel Poverty Coalition co-ordinator Simon Francis said that instead of offering help, the government has axed winter fuel payments to millions and refuses to confirm if the Household Support Fund will be extended.

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“The reality is that bills will go up compared to today and will be around 65 per cent higher than they were before the energy bills crisis started.

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https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/splash-288

Continue ReadingLabour urged to act over 9% rise to energy bills

UK: Civil servant who resigned was formerly lead author of arms assessment

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https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-civil-servant-who-resigned-formerly-assessed-arms-sales-legality-foreign-office

Mark Smith said he had been the lead author of the central assessment governing the legality of UK arms sales to the Middle East

The British civil servant who resigned over concerns that the government is complicit in Israeli war crimes in Gaza has said he was formerly the lead author of the central assessment governing the legality of UK arms sales in the Foreign Office’s Middle East and North Africa Directorate.

Diplomat Mark Smith’s resignation was first reported when prominent journalist Hind Hassan posted the contents of his resignation letter on X on Friday evening. On Saturday Middle East Eye confirmed the resignation through two sources familiar with the situation.

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In a statement issued on Sunday, Smith added that he was the lead author of the central assessment governing the legality of UK arms sales in the Middle East and North Africa Directorate.

He said: “It was my job to gather all relevant information regarding civilian casualties, international law compliance as well as assess the commitment and capabilities of the countries in question.”

“To export arms to any nation, the UK must be satisfied that the recipient nation has in place robust procedures to avoid civilian casualties and to minimize harm to civilian life. It is impossible to argue that Israel is doing that.”

It is unclear when Smith, who appears to have been at the British embassy in Dublin since at least 2022, was in this role.

Smith said he has written to Foreign Secretary David Lammy informing him of his resignation.

“I sincerely hope that he will listen to the concerns of Civil Servants on this issue and make the necessary changes.”

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https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uk-civil-servant-who-resigned-formerly-assessed-arms-sales-legality-foreign-office

UK Labour Party Shadow Foreign Secretary repeatedly heckled at a speech to the Fabian Society over his and the Labour Party's support for and complicity in Israel's genocide of Gaza.
UK Labour Party Shadow Foreign Secretary repeatedly heckled at a speech to the Fabian Society over his and the Labour Party’s support for and complicity in Israel’s genocide of Gaza.
Continue ReadingUK: Civil servant who resigned was formerly lead author of arms assessment