Andrew Montford

Maria Eagle is talking nonsense about floods and climate change

The Shadow Environment Secretary Maria Eagle headed off to Woking today, where she addressed an audience of environmentalists at WWF’s swanky new headquarters.

Her speech, which was widely trailed, was full of silly season fare, and her superficial understanding of the climate debate shines through. Take this for example:

‘The Met Office, the Committee on Climate Change and the overwhelming majority of the scientific community all tell us that last winter’s floods are consistent with the projected consequences of climate change.’ 

‘Consistent with’ is one of those gloriously weasel phrases that the more disreputable kind of climate scientist likes to use when speaking to politicians. Yes of course the floods were consistent with the projected consequences of climate change. They were also consistent with no global warming, with global cooling and with climate change being caused by green men from Mars.

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