A GROUP of Government backbenchers is disputing the science that says humans are responsible for global warming, likening it to other historic claims that were later found to be incorrect.The Liberal MPs Dennis Jensen, Danna Vale and Jackie Kelly and the Country Liberal MP David Tollner issued a dissenting report yesterday to a Government committee investigation into the viability of geosequestration - the storage of carbon dioxide - as a solution to climate change.
"The evidence that human beings are changing the global climate is certainly not compelling," the four MPs said. They also said that the most comprehensive study into the economic consequences of climate change, the Stern report, had been "thoroughly debunked". They said the British Government-commissioned report by the former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern was part of a dangerous trend where "most of the public statements that promote the dangerous human warming scare are made from a position of ignorance - by political leaders, press commentators and celebrities who share the characteristics of lack of scientific training and lack of an ability to differentiate between sound science and computer-based scare mongering".
The views expressed by the group - dubbed the Flat Earth Four by one lobbyist - present a challenge for the Prime Minister, John Howard, who has been determined to dispel doubts he is not serious about climate change. (Sydney Morning Herald)
