31st March 2008

Industry lobbyists are dominating parts of the European law-making process, according to a new report launched this month by Alter-EU that analysed the membership of a number of Commission Expert Groups.

The report "Secrecy and corporate dominance - a study on the composition and transparency of European Commission Expert Groups" reveals that industry representatives have a disproportionate influence on a number of the Commission's most controversial Expert Groups, including advisory groups on issues such as biotechnology, clean coal and car emissions.

Expert Groups are established by the Commission to provide advice on the development of new laws and policies, giving group members considerable power over EU legislation, the report says.

The report author Yiorgos Vassalos of Corporate Europe Observatory said: "Expert Groups are responsible for shaping policies on some of the most controversial issues being dealt with by the European Commission. Information about who has access in this crucial initial stage of decision making is not made public, but our research shows that industry representatives are playing an important role. These groups should act in the public interest, but it appears that some are being allowed to further their own commercial interests."

17 March, 2008

If the scientists are right climate change is the biggest threat facing humanity. Hardly a day goes by without a dire warning of rising temperatures, increased drought, more violent weather, and melting ice-caps.

One of the criticisms of the mainstream media is that, when it comes to ecological issues, they might preach others to change their ways, but are unable to do so themselves. Editorially they may take a progressive stance on climate change, but their paper is still filled with offers for cheap flights and planes.

Sometimes the irony is just too much: Take the front page of Sunday’s Observer . The paper ran the headline “Glaciers melt ‘at fastest rate in past 5,000 years”. To accompany the news piece there was a link to the feature article “Lost glaciers start countdown to climate chaos”. Underneath was an advert for Ryanair offering: “1 million free seats: No Taxes, fees or charges”.

The Observer warns us about climate chaos, but continues to take advertising from companies that are directly responsible for the coming chaos.

Twice over the last month we have received emails from people who say they just happened to be surfing the web searching their name and found something that we had written that they disagree with.

 Now I don’t know if this is a new phenomenon where there are millions of people at work and home happily “googling” their name to see what happens. If this is true I hope your name is not something like “John Smith”, otherwise you are going to get repetitive strain injury. 

Anyway one of the emails was from Richard D North who, in an “idle egocentric moment,” had been trawling on line and found a letter I had written to the Evening Standard concerning one of his articles. 

Now for those of you who do not know Richard, he has become something of a bete noir of the British environmental movement, a bit like the Canadian corporate lackey, Patrick Moore. Patrick Moore still labels himself a founder of Greenpeace, as he sells his services to various polluting industries, over twenty years after he left the organisation.

North may not be able to claim such kudos on his CV, but does rake up being an ex-environmental correspondent for the Independent to beef up his credentials. But that was a long time ago too and he is now a fellow at two right-wing think tanks the Social Affairs Unit, and Institute of Economic Affairs.

Just over two years ago, I gave a talk on climate skeptics and included in passing the fact that the organization, the Science Media Centre, networked with known skeptics, including those from the LM crowd.

In the audience at the Royal Society of Chemistry event was science writer, Vivienne Parry, who is on the board of the SMC. Parry asked me to justify my comments and said, in an email “if you have any material which you think demonstrates bias, political/corporate pressure or whatever in relation to the SMC - send it to me, and we will discuss it at the next SMC board meeting.”

I sent the SMC a dossier of material on various aspects including the issue of bias, especially in relation to its work on climate and genetic engineering. My concerns were dismissed by the SMC’s board. In an email Alan Winter Chairman of the SMC board wrote “Whilst we note your concerns, we are reassured by the overwhelmingly positive feedback we have had about the Director and her team from the hundreds of leading scientists, press officers and journalists who make regular use of the Centre.”

Sadly for the SMC the ugly head of bias has surfaced again, but this time on nuclear power. Earlier this month, the British government gave the go ahead to a new generation of nuclear power plants. In response the SMC issued a press release, entitled “Major energy and engineering institutions support new nuclear build”. This was picked up by the Nuclear Industry Association which ran the same headline on its website.

 10 January 2008

As the British Government announces the go-ahead for a new generation of nuclear power plants in the UK, Nuclear Spin reveals the pro-nuclear covert campaign underway in British schools.

For example, in 2006, the national curriculum was changed so that it became compulsory for schools to teach all 14-16 year olds about nuclear power. The move was largely sparked by a report for the Department for Trade and Industry written by the Nuclear Skills Group, made up of Government officials and a panel of six ‘independent members’.

In the report only one, Paul Thomas, was said to be working for BNFL. But NuclearSpin has discovered that two more members were also working for BNFL.

One of the nuclear industry’s largest education projects is called Energy Foresight, run by Young Foresight, which in turn has been paid hundreds of thousands of pounds by nuclear organisations to develop a set of teaching materials “that present radioactivity and related issues in personal and social contexts.” Energy Foresight’s material’s have been criticized by independent nuclear consultant John Large as “a blatant piece of propaganda… it misleads”.

For more on this go here 

November 16, 2007 

Its that time of year again – the worst EU Lobbying and Greenwash Awards 2007. Once again all your favourites - oil companies, car companies, nuclear companies, and PR companies are on the short-list. If you want to vote go here.

The ‘Worst EU Lobbying’ Award is to be given to the lobbyist, company or lobby group that in 2007 has employed the most deceptive, misleading, or otherwise problematic lobbying tactics in their attempts to influence EU decision-making.

 12 October 2007

 The BBC is making a real hash of the Al Gore story. Today on Radio Four’s flagship lunch-time news programme, it invited Martin Livermore from the Scientific Alliance, to give an interview on Gore winning the Nobel Prize.

As we have blogged on the site, the Scientific Alliance was set up by Scottish quarryman Robert Durward in 2001 to fight environmental regulations and take the sceptical line on climate change.

It was one of the first “corporate front groups” to be set up in the UK. It has consistently tried to undermine climate science and networked with Exxon-funded groups in the US and UK.

However rather than saying the Alliance undermines the debate on climate science, the BBC’s presenter Shaun Ley described the Alliance as “campaigning to improve the quality of debate about science”.

 11 October 2007

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.

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”.

12 September 2007

So the PR industry is gearing up for a scrap. Those masters of the dark arts will be compiling a whole host of tricks to try to hoodwink the UK Parliament’s Public Administration Committee that is currently looking into the lobbying industry.

Outsiders argue that the inquiry, which is the first Parliamentary investigation on lobbying since 1991, is long overdue. Since then, lobbying has been at the centre of sleaze and too many political scandals to mention.

But the fight back has begun. Key PR insiders are warning about how the industry needs to pull together to “salvage our reputation”. Writing in PR Week , Peter Bingle from Bell Pottinger, says that “there is no point rehearsing in public the view that we welcome the inquiry. We don’t. I have yet to meet a member of the industry who does.”

May 23, 2007 

As the British Government launches its new White Paper today and argues that our future is nuclear, anyone interested in the debate should check out the updated NuclearSpin site.

NuclearSpin was originally launched in response to the British Government’s 12-week consultation on energy in 2006.

Earlier this year, the High Court ruled that the Government’s plans to build a new generation of nuclear power stations were “unlawful” and the way it consulted with the public over the decision was “misleading, seriously flawed, manifestly inadequate and procedurally unfair”. Now the British Government is trying again with a new consultation exercise. 

As like last time though, it seems the British government has already made up its mind. Months before the first consultation Blair convened a secret meeting at Chequers where informed sources have said that nuclear was given the green light.

The Observer newspaper is reporting that Blair’s successor, Gordon Brown, will also support a new generation of nuclear plants in the UK.  What makes this decision politically sensitive, is that Gordon Brown has close family connections to the nuclear industry. His younger brother Andrew Brown works for EDF Energy, the UK subsidiary of EDF, which is one of the leading companies pushing for a nuclear rebuild programme in the UK.

The Labour Government is also speeding up the planning process, making it easier for nuclear power plants to be built. Planning Minister, Yvette Cooper has already had to fight off criticism of "nuclear cronyism" due to her father's links to the nuclear industry too.