Healthy scepticism over climate change

Published on 05/07/2010 17:36

ONCE it was an inconvenient truth, one which just about everyone accepted. Now it seems scepticism is creeping in over the issue of the moment: the supposedly indisputable scientific evidence of climate change.

As we reveal today, nearly a third of Scots have changed their minds on the subject, citing the recent very cold winter and the controversies over the validity of climate change science.

The poll tells us what ordinary people, not the scientific or political elite, think of the issue and shows that the evidence of their own experience, and the debate over whether climate change research is entirely sound, has had an impact.

As this newspaper has often argued, there are doubts over climate change, particularly over whether the temperature rises are significant over a long period of time.

Duncan McLaren, chief executive of Friends of the Earth Scotland argues a large majority of people still recognise climate change is happening, is primarily caused by humans mandate and want governments to act on it.

This poll should be a warning to Mr McLaren and other "green" groups not to take the public for granted. The public is becoming more sceptical because it is beginning to challenge a modern-day orthordoxy. That can only be healthy for our democracy — and for the future of the planet.