Climate of opinion

The government has declared the scientific debate on global warming ‘closed’. A dwindling minority of scientists still contest that claim, but let us assume, for the sake of argument, that ministers are right. The trap into which they risk falling is to confuse scientific orthodoxy and the inclinations of the liberal elite with mainstream public opinion.

Next week, David Miliband, the Environment Secretary, will publish the Climate Change Bill which was promised in last November’s Queen’s Speech. In doing so he will have a chance to prove that the government has a coherent strategy to tackle global warming and — no less important — to encourage practical changes in public behaviour. The politics of this moment are fraught: Gordon Brown, the prime minister-in-waiting, is not instinctively green, while David Cameron has put climate change at the very heart of the Conservative revival. Mr Miliband did not panic during the recent avian flu outbreak.