Climate zealots infiltrate our public service

THIS must be stopped

Around the world, climate sceptics increasingly challenge governments over policies to change the weather. From furious French Yellow Vest protests against climate policy, soaring petrol taxes, education reform and a raft of other issues to Canadian provinces’ increasingly tough resistance to Justin Trudeau’s aggressive carbon pricing, Australian political opposition, frank climate rebellion among EU members and with numerous nations renouncing climate commitments, sceptics around the globe have grown truculent as never before.

In New Zealand an exciting new tactic confronts the brazen neglect of a public servant’s oath of neutrality. Now that decades of toxic activism have corrupted climate science and made public debate difficult or impossible, this partial avoidance of science might save the country and harness the great well of scepticism in our heartlands.

Whether it’s based on science or ethics, any tactic that prevents this climate madness from wrecking our country is virtuous. If the Greens refuse to hear the science, punch them in the face with their own ruthless morality.

Last year, the Ministry for the Environment acted in support of the Government’s Zero Carbon Bill (now an Act) by publishing Our Climate Your Say (pdf, 1.4 MB), in June.

For many of us, this Consultation Document was our introduction to the Green Party’s lamentable designs for our future. It has been analysed here a number of times amid widespread opposition to it on scientific, legal and rational grounds. Discussions on this blog have exposed many of the Act’s legal and scientific mistakes.

No objective evidence

Now a good keen man accuses a senior public servant of bias in creating Our Climate Your Say. Robin Grieve is chairman of Pastural Farming Climate Research Inc, of Whangarei, a charitable organisation that studies pastoral farming carbon emissions and promotes fairness for agricultural producers under climate policies.

Robin says Vicky Robertson, Secretary for the Environment, is responsible for the Consultation Document, which contains opinions “without objective evidence of any kind.”

He began asking the Ministry for the Environment in 2018 for “any official NZ weather or climate records or other official reports relied upon” to make certain specified statements in the Consultation Document.

The Ministry replied that it was partially refusing his request under the Official Information Act (OIA) because “the information is publicly available,” telling him where to find the information. However, the information wasn’t there, and there was no reference to official New Zealand weather or climate records that might have justified these claims in the Consultation Document:

Unjustified statements

• Each year, NZ is seeing more and more extreme weather events.
• More recently, NZ has suffered more frequent and severe weather events (flooding,
  droughts and wildfires).
• The frequency and the severity of storms, coastal and river flooding, droughts and
  wildfires are increasing.

These statements, Robin says, were clearly subjective and unresearched. He also requested evidence relied upon for these further claims in the Consultation Document:

• The Zero Carbon proposal will “create jobs.”
• The proposal will “upgrade our economy” so we will “be better paid.”
• The proposal will “make New Zealanders better off while reducing emissions.”
• “Countries like us make up around 30% of total emissions.”
• “NZ’s per capita emissions are high compared with similar economies in OECD countries.”
• “In recent years, increased emissions have caused the global climate to change rapidly.”

Most of these statements fly in the face of evidence Robin located. He claims they can only be the product of bias.

A very late reply

Robin engaged lawyer Barry Brill, known to readers of the CCG as a frequent guest author and chairman of the NZ Climate Science Coalition. Barry sent the letter reproduced below (the source of much of this article) to the Secretary.

Receiving no acknowledgement, Robin then lodged a formal complaint with Peter Hughes, the State Services Commissioner, who bears statutory responsibility for maintaining the public service’s political neutrality, free and frank advice, openness and transparency. Surely that leaves no leeway for fudging your facts.

The Commissioner is now investigating.

Only then did Ms Robertson reply to Robin’s requests and try to justify statements in the Consultation Document. Robin replied to that carefully, line by line, with a paper detailing the complete lack of scientific evidence for increased “extreme weather events.”

I must say that her failure to reply promptly is difficult to understand. All large public departments have staff dedicated to dealing with OIA requests, the requests are governed by strict legislation and CEOs must be very well aware of the dangers inherent in ignoring them. The legal advice she received was surely deficient if it didn’t point this out.

Law leaves no doubt public servants MUST be neutral, YET

The Consultation Document:

• Gets all three ‘FACTS’ that justify the zero carbon targets WRONG.
• Says the ZCB aims to bind future Parliaments (a constitutional TABOO).
• Claimed to ask for feedback but allowed no alternatives, pressed a more aggressive approach and was heavily slanted to the Green Party’s 2050 target (not in the Paris Agreement).
• Mentions no controversial science, no benefits of CO2 or warming and no cost-benefit analyses.
• Lists benefits of the ZCB that don’t depend on any emissions target, let alone zero, and heavily obfuscates the economic modelling.

Finally (in the document that keeps on giving)

The Consultation Document states

In 2015, almost every nation decided to take action together to address climate change by adopting the Paris Agreement. It sets the world on the path to net zero emissions BY the second half of the century (OCYS, SPM, p. 9). – emphasis added

This is, of course, patently incorrect, because the Paris Agreement says:

Article 4
1. In order to achieve the long-term temperature goal set out in Article 2, Parties aim to reach global peaking of greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible, recognizing that peaking will take longer for developing country Parties, and to undertake rapid reductions thereafter in accordance with best available science, so as to achieve a balance between anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases in the second half of this century, on the basis of equity, and in the context of sustainable development and efforts to eradicate poverty. – emphasis added

So, the international deadline for the government’s glorious improvement in the weather is the last day of 2100, fifty years after this supposedly neutral “Consultation Document” claimed.

Here is the letter sent to the Secretary on Robin’s behalf, which you can download here. I hope to have further relevant material later, but in the meantime, what are your thoughts?

UPDATED 13 December 2019

Some minor polishing of writing and formatting, Robin Grieve’s personal details corrected and expanded, and last-minute thoughts given expression.

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