Shocking Error Mars Good Law Project's Campaign Against Talk's Climate Coverage

A transparent effort to shut down debate

The lawfare operation Good Law Project has demanded the UK broadcast regulator Ofcom stop the Murdoch-owned Talk station broadcasting “climate misinformation”. In campaign literature it claims that “toxic channel” Talk, “regularly spouts misinformation about the climate crisis”, using a headline claim that a guest recently said climate science “doesn’t add up to a row of beans”. Alas, this is wholly incorrect. Your correspondent should know, I am supposed to have said it. What in fact I observed last November to presenter Ian Collins (here, at one hour 15 minutes) was that Net Zero promoters “were backing it up with science that doesn’t add up to a row of beans”.

As an independent journalist covering climate and Net Zero for a number of years, I would never dismiss the entirety of climate science in this childish way. A check via Grok confirms this statement. There is some good science around climate and there is a great deal of bad, at times fraudulent, work. Misrepresenting my words could be considered highly damaging, libellous even, although on this occasion I am inclined to discount malevolence in favour of incompetence. I could demand a correction, but on the other hand, who gives a toss.

The Good Law Project is an activist operation promoting what are described as progressive causes. It receives funding from individual donations, but also collects cash from foundations such as Joseph Rowntree, the hard-Left money tree. Also listed as a donor is Dale Vince, owner of the state-subsidy dependent Ecotricity. This latest attack on science and political free speech also involves an outfit called Stop Funding Heat (SFH). This is a small band of activists that recently persuaded Damian Carrington of the Guardian to take up its cause. He quoted campaigners who claimed Ofcom was allowing GB News and others to “flout” accuracy rules and broadcast “climate change denial”. Just two broadcast media in the UK offer any critical perspective on climate change. The rest hide behind the preposterous notion that the science is ‘settled’ and use this convenient bias to promote the Net Zero fantasy.

In a letter dated January 26th on behalf of SFH to Ofcom, the Good Law Project says its client has submitted 71 complaints since April 2024 about “climate misinformation and bias broadcasting” by GB News and Talk. Except for two still under review, all are noted to have been dismissed. It further states that information from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero and the Guardian reveals 1,221 complaints about the alleged misinformation were submitted to Ofcom over the last five years. Each of these complaints was rejected.