By Paul Homewood
h/t Russell Hicks
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Matt McGrath must be wetting himself over Labour’s election win!
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Hi – I’m Matt McGrath and I’m an environment correspondent on the BBC News Climate & Science team here in Cardiff.
I’ve been involved in reporting issues relating to climate change and the environment for the past couple of decades – from the shattering disappointment of COP15, the 2009 UN climate summit in Copenhagen, to the hopes for progress that were rekindled in Dubai just last year.
So while our climate editor Justin Rowlatt is off for a few weeks, I’ll be writing this newsletter. Nice to meet you!
And wow, what a week it’s been.
Labour’s landslide election victory gives the party a real opportunity to take significant steps on climate change.
But will the ambition of Labour’s election campaign promises turn into the dull prose of government? Or will this incoming administration be the most radical on climate change in British history?
The silly little man seems to genuinely believe that Miliband can actually change the world’s weather.
Showing such flagrant political bias of course is totally against BBC rules, but they won’t do anything about it.
The newsletter contains the usual codswallop. In particular, a claim that Hurricane Beryl was made worse by climate change.
It asks for questions and feedback to be sent to:
So I suggest we all send our comments to Justin!
This is my response:
In reference to Matt McGrath’s newsletter sent yesterday, I have a couple of comments:
1) He talks about " significant steps on climate change" – does he really beleive that Ed Miliband can change the world’s weather?
2) It also claims that climate change made Hurricane Beryl worse – but actual hurricane experts deny that hurricanes have become stronger since the start of records in 1851
For instance, NOAA clearly stated in their annual report earlier this year:
"There is no strong evidence of century-scale increasing trends in U.S. landfalling hurricanes or major hurricanes. Similarly for Atlantic basin-wide hurricane frequency (after adjusting for changing observing capabilities over time), there is not strong evidence for an increase since the late 1800s in hurricanes, major hurricanes, or the proportion of hurricanes that reach major hurricane intensity."
Maybe your next newsletter could mention this fact.