Revealed: Liam Fox's Trade Department is Taking Advice from 'Experts' with Links to Climate Science Denial Networks

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Hardline Brexiteers with links to a network of organisations spreading disinformation about climate change have seats on an expert committee closely advising international trade secretary Liam Fox, a freedom of information request reveals.ย ย ย 

The five-member committee includes Peter Lilley, one of the board members of the climate science denial campaign group, the Global Warming Policy Foundation.

Lilley hinted at his role within the committee earlier this year when an investigation by Channel 4โ€™s Dispatches and the Sunday Times secretly recorded him and former ministers Lord Lansley and Andrew Mitchell offering information about the UK governmentโ€™s approach to Brexit to a fictitious Chinese company in exchange for money. All three have denied anyย wrongdoing.

During the recording, Lilley boasted about his strong ties to the government and said: โ€œThe other thing I am involved with โ€“ Liam Fox has set-up a committee of experts of which I amย oneโ€.

Now DeSmog UK can reveal for the first time the details of thatย committee.ย 

Although the Department for International Trade (DIT) did not confirm whether Fox personally created the committee, it said it was formed on 10 October 2017, days before a crunch EU summit over the Brexitย deal.

A DIT spokesman described it as an โ€œofficial-led committee of independent specialists which advises and supports officials on matters related to trade and investmentโ€. The DIT added it engages with other experts and academics on similar issues outside of the committee. The committee has no budget and members are not paid for their advisoryย role.

Here is a run down of the committeeโ€™s fiveย members.

Peterย Lilley

A former Conservative MP, Lilley is known for sitting on the board of trustees of the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF).

He has a history of consistently voting against policy measures to tackle climate change and he was one of three MPs to vote against the UKโ€™s Climate Change Act in 2008. He later joined a group seeking to repeal theย act.

Despite his stance on the issue, he was a member of the government’s environmental audit committee and Parliamentโ€™s energy and climate change committee.

In 2014, he voted against the committeeโ€™s acceptance of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changeโ€™s (IPCC) conclusion that humans are the dominant cause of globalย warming.

Lilley has described himself as a โ€œglobal lukewarmistโ€. He previously argued that while he accepts carbon dioxide does have a warming effect on the planet, this effect is unknown and could be beneficial forย plants.

He stepped down as an MP ahead of the 2017 general election. He was expected to be offered a peerage prior to Channel 4 airing itsย exposรฉ.

Shankerย Singham

Shanker Singham was recently appointed director of the international trade and competition unit at the Institute for Economic Affairs (IEA) โ€”ย a free-market think-tank with close ties to theย hub of right-leaning organisations, including climate science denying GWPF, based atย 55 Tufton Street.

In hisย role, Singham will make the case for the removal of trade barriers as the UK prepares to exit the EU ย โ€” a core value of the IEA, which promotes deregulation across all sectors, including theย environment.

The IEA also plays a leading role among a group of 80 organisations worldwide advocating similar aims. The Atlas Economic Research Foundation and the International Policy Network which are part of the IEAโ€™s network are also known to spread climate scienceย denial.

Before joining the IEA, Singham was widely seen as one of the top Brexit policy advisers to the government through his role at the Legatum Institute, a think tank focused on โ€œincreasing prosperity and human flourishingโ€. OpenDemocracy described Leagtum as โ€œthe Brexiteersโ€™ favourite think tankโ€ and โ€œarguably the most influential think tank in the countryโ€.

Both the IEA and the Legatum Institute were named among a group of transatlantic organisations set to hold โ€œshadow trade talksโ€ in a bid to significantly weaken existing regulation, according to documents uncovered by Unearthed.

On the US side of the talks, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), the Heritage Foundation, the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), ย the Manhattan Institute and the Cato Institute are listed as official partners โ€” ย all of them have strong ties to climate science denial misinformation campaigns in the US.

Ruthย Lea

Ruth Lea is an economic adviser at Arbuthnot Banking Group but her career spans across the civil service, policy research and the media. She is an advisor to the IEA.

Leaโ€™s questioned climate science in aย 2011 Perspectives column for Arbuthnot Banking Group titled โ€œBritainโ€™s high energy prices: the folly of wind powerโ€ in which she criticised the UKโ€™s climate policy for driving up energy prices. She argued that โ€œโ€˜green policiesโ€™ were damaging businessโ€ and that Britainโ€™s climate and emission reduction policy was having โ€œzero net impact on global emissions totalsโ€. She also blamed the Climate Change Act for advocating the use of โ€œcostly and intermittentโ€ windย power:

โ€œEven if one accepts the need to cut carbon emissions, not a universal sentiment by any means, it is clear that the dash for wind-power can only be โ€˜justifiedโ€™ by Britainโ€™s misguided commitment to the 15 percent renewables target by 2020,โ€ sheย wrote.

However, Leaโ€™s projections of energy prices more than doubling by 2020 proved untrue. Over the last few years, the price of renewable energy has dropped significantly with onshore and offshore wind and solar energy now cheaper than new gas, according to governmentย projections.

Liamย Halligan

An economist and journalist for the Sunday Telegraph, Halligan has written for a number of nationalย publications.

He is a columnist for hardline Brexiteer Tim Montgomerieโ€™s recently launched UnHerd media platform, which offers commentary on themes such as globalisation, technology and theย media.

In a 2014 article for The Telegraph, Halligan reported on Owen Patersonโ€™s annual lecture to the GWPF during which the North Shropshire MP attacked the climate consensus and urged his audience to โ€œstand up to the bullies of the environmental movementโ€ by dropping emission reduction targets and repealing the Climate Change Act. It later emerged the speech had been written by prominent climate science denier, Matt Ridley.

Halligan described Patersonโ€™s intervention as โ€œa corkerโ€. โ€œFrom the back of the hall, I saw before me a speaker at the top of his game and an audience transfixed. It was passionate, old-school oratory, the likes of which seems rare in contemporary public life,โ€ heย said.

The piece was a shift from his previous stance on the issue. In a 2006 column, Halligan recognised the โ€œhuge commercial opportunitiesโ€ linked to tackling climate change and particularly new energy sources, adding โ€œwe need to get the policy framework right and we need to moveย fastโ€.

Xavierย Rolet

Xavier Rolet was CEO of the London Stock Exchange (LSE) between 2009 and 2017. ย The LSE is one of the most carbon intensive markets in the world.

His departure was overshadowed by a reported row with one of the companyโ€™s shareholders forcing the group to ask Rolet to leave his post a year before planned. His departure on the eve of Brexit sparked much speculation among the financialย press.

A Frenchman determined to keep the UK in the EU, Rolet embraced the Brexit vote following the referendum result. He has accompanied Prime Minister Theresa May to Saudi Arabia in a bid to convince one of the worldโ€™s largest oil company Aramco to list in London โ€” a show of his influence on the governmentโ€™s Brexitย approach.

To find out more about the key players spreading disinformation on climate change in the UK, check out DeSmogUKโ€™s Disinformation Database.

Image Credit: Foreign and Commonwealth Office/Flickr/CC BYย 2.0

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