From THE DAILY SCEPTIC

by Chris Morrison

The dark financial tentacles of the Green Blob help curate mainstream media, brainwash young children, fund large areas of climate pseudoscience, initiate and finance lawfare operations and bankroll countless ‘grassroots’ agitprop operations. But political influence is highly prized, so local government representatives and city mayors are prime targets. Alas, these people come and go at the fickle whim of local electors. But not so the unelected members of the British House of Lords, who have considerable powers of altering proposed legislation from the elected House of Commons. It is hardly surprising that the noble lords and ladies have been targeted by the Blob given the potential for inserting Net Zero mischief into almost every type of legislation. Step forward Peers for the Planet (P4P), which claims a ‘caucus’ of 160 members, but was started as an activist body and is funded by sizeable contributions from the usual billionaire foundations.

The operation appears to have been set up around 2020 by Lynette Huntley, the former Chief of Staff at Channel 4 TV. In a recent podcast she explained that she was attracted by harnessing all the skills of members of the Lords to the complexity and scale of climate change. A number of Net Zero obsessives such as Baroness ‘Rosie’ Boycott are listed as Directors responsible for oversight while a cross-party advisory panel lists other hydrocarbon haters such as former Green Party leader Baroness ‘Natalie’ Bennett. There is a claimed ‘caucus’ of 160 members, although few are mentioned by name, and the group is run by a number of full-time employees with considerable expertise in promoting political causes.

None of this can occur without the help of large amounts of money and this comes from many of the foundations familiar to regular readers of the Daily Sceptic. Laudes and the Climate Change Collaboration are regular providers of green cash but it is interesting to note the appearance of a couple of smaller funds operating at the more colourful end of the market. The Pickwell Foundation’s two interests are people displacement and climate. Support is given to migrants who have been displaced due to a number of reasons including “economic necessity”. The help is said to extend to people seeking sanctuary “through irregular routes”. According to P4P, its funders “have no involvement in the day-to-day work of the group”. Pickwell seems to take a different view. “As well as providing financial support, we also want to actively engage with the work and campaigns of our partners and to provide whatever advocacy we can,” it observes.

Another helpful cash fund, operating no doubt out of the goodness of its heart, is Gower Street. It sprays its largesse around a number of other Westminster activist operations including the Labour Climate and Environment Forum and the Conservative Environment Network. Meanwhile, Climate Emergency U.K. is helped to “inspire and organise local council climate action”, while Fossil Free Pride aims to “end the links between climate wreckers and queer culture”. Funding for a new Extinction Rebellion offshoot, run by old XR hands Gail Bradbrook and Stuart Basden, helps “make good on the potential of Extinction Rebellion”.

The P4P money obviously helps fund a considerable propaganda effort and shows how the activists attempt to change legislation reviewed in the Lords. The footling Football Governance Bill is attempting to introduce a new state-mandated regulator to oversee the privately-run and hugely successful football business in England. A recent note from P4P whined that there was nothing in the bill about climate change or the need for adaption and resilience planning. It was proposed that amendments be made to the legislation attaching “Net Zero measures” to club licensing conditions.

Backing up these invented and wholly unnecessary wealth-destroying regulations is the usual guff about bad weather. A climate model prediction from Zurich Insurance is noted and this claims that out of 92 stadiums in the top English leagues, 39 will face a high risk from climate hazards including flooding, extreme rainfall, drought and windstorms. In his annual review of the U.K. climate, Paul Homewood quoted data that showed sea level rises were showing no acceleration over multi-decadal scales, rainfall was not becoming more extreme, while storms have been less powerful over recent years. For insurance companies, flooding is bad news for the current bottom line but excellent marketing material to boost future premium income. In fact, given how much rain falls in England, the building on flood plains and the declining state of protection measures, it is surprising how few properties are actually flooded every year – around 5,000 to March 2024, and nothing out of the ordinary going back to the turn of the century according to a graph from the Environment Agency.

Elder worship is highly prized in many cultures but there is a marked difference between listening to a wise councillor and being forced to put up with intellectually-challenged old nags with nothing better to do than cause trouble. Look at the damage these duffers could do if they started interfering in life-and-death subjects that really mattered.

A recent P4P briefing claimed that humans had disrupted the natural nitrogen cycle by taking it from its inert state and transforming its use across the economy in a number of areas including agriculture. Of course, you could make a similar statement about any natural element that humans have exploited to survive on Earth. In the case of nitrogen, human ingenuity has used it in a fertiliser process that has boosted world food supplies to levels unimaginable barely a hundred years ago. Yet it is suggested that “nitrogen pollution” was one of the biggest drivers of biodiversity loss in the world along with climate change and habitat loss – an unprovable claim missing only the usual ‘scientists say’ qualification. Of course you don’t need a particularly learned scientist to state the undeniable fact that if the neo-nobility in the U.K. and elsewhere start banning nitrogen fertiliser, half the population of the world will be at risk of starvation.

Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.