Labour MP Graham Stringer over Climategate en wetenschappelijke integriteit

Twelve years ago the now disgraced Dr Wakefield produced a piece of fraudulent research for his own financial gain which purported to show a link between the triple vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella and autism. As well as carrying out unnecessary and painful invasive procedures on 12 children, this fiddled research led to a huge drop in vaccination levels. Now there are hundreds of thousands of un-immunised children who are vulnerable to measles, which is again endemic in the UK. Wakefield was not exposed by the academic, medical or scientific establishment but by the extraordinary and determined efforts of Brian Deer, a Sunday Times journalist. It took him twelve years. Reading his account of how he achieved his success I was struck by enormous similarities with the investigation into the leaked emails from the University of East Anglia (UEA) in November 2009 – the so called Climategate scandal. Remember how badly the emails read: ‘hide the decline’ and ‘delete any emails you may have had’ looked like a straight forward case of scientific jiggery-pokery.

Lord Oxburgh who was appointed to chair this panel, disappointed everybody. He explained that the Vice Chancellor was new and did not understand what he had promised. He soon made it clear that he would not reassess the science but he was just going to satisfy himself as to the integrity of the scientists. After a cosy chat with the Climatic Research Unit scientists he decided that they were decent chaps.

The other review carried out by Sir Muir Russell His review was charged with looking at the e-mails themselves. One of the main charges against Professor Jones was that he deleted e-mails that would show he was up to no good scientifically. In a situation that is almost beyond parody Muir Russell stated that he didn’t ask Jones whether he had deleted the e-mails because they would have had to interview Jones under caution. What was the solution then? The Vice Chancellor asked Jones whether he had deleted the e-mails. This rather negated the purpose of having an independent inquiry when the only person to ask the crucial question was the Vice Chancellor who saw his prime responsibility to the good name of the University. The accused investigating themselves again.

The work of the research unit is central to the manmade global warming thesis. There are proposals to increase worldwide taxation by up to a trillion dollars on the basis of climate science predictions. This is an area where strong and opposing views are held. The release of the unit’s e-mails from the and the accusations that followed demanded independent and objective scrutiny of the science by independent panels. This did not happen. We now know that the work done at Climatic Research Unit barely qualified as science; they kept it secret to stop other scientists checking it; thus breaching one of the foundations of the scientific method.