Squirrels and beavers put a glitch into the modelling that has been used to chart climate warming

All mouth, like a greenie … and bad for the environment, too.

All those tiresome greenies and lefties who have been giving our wonderful National-led government a hard time over climate warming should go back to the drawing board.

New information has emerged about the causes of global warming which suggest they have to revisit the models that show rising temperatures and which by and large get too many people into a great deal of bother about the world’s future.

This information is being disseminated today and highlights the role of rodents (a category into which your hard-working MP is apt to place greenies and lefties).

An account can be found here in Britain’s The Telegraph:

Yes, Nick Smith is taking a punt with climate change – but so did Rodney with the Super City

A sartorial turn-off - and he's blinkered about Auckland, too.

Those tossers at ACT have a bloody nerve.

Mind you, lots of nerve is needed when membership requires you to be led by a bloke who wears yellow jackets.

In this case, however, Alf is talking about the nerve of John Boscowen, who basks in the title of ACT Deputy Leader and Climate Change Spokesman.

He has got all huffy about climate change matters, and is demanding to know

… how Climate Change Minister Dr Nick Smith could propose to reduce New Zealand greenhouse gas emissions to 50 percent below 1990 levels by 2050 when he does not even know what effect this target will have on jobs and GDP.

The answer is simple.

You take a bloody big punt, you stand up and you propose it.

And if you don’t know what will happen as a consequence – well, that’s just too bad.

A note of caution: don’t let the Aussie company tax decision divert our attention from the ETS

Alf has only just caught up with an on-line account of what ACT MP John Boscawen had to say about the emissions trading scheme at the weekend.

Boscowen reckons National backbenchers as well as some senior Government Ministers now want to defer the scheme.

Speaking on TV3’s “The Nation” Mr Boscawen said the Government needed to immediately to defer the scheme now that Australia has decided to defer its scheme.

The New Zealand scheme is due to begin on July 1.

“I’ve heard from several sources in recent days that several members of Cabinet are concerned, “he said.

“Back bench lobby MPs are lobbying Cabinet Ministers, they’re very concerned about the damage it’s going to do to New Zealand and the damage there is to their re-election prospects.”

Dunno about the others, but Alf can be counted among the Nat back-benchers who are very unhappy with our team’s determination to go ahead with the ETS scheme.

Another political skiver – Key puts a Danish dinner date ahead of delivering a three-minute speech

So which one will John Key pick up to get to his dinner engagement?

Alf is far from happy with The Boss this morning.

John Key has gone all the way to Copenhagen for the much-ballyhooed greenhouse gas bunfight, but he won’t be delivering New Zealand’s speech at the international climate negotiations.

Nope. Not because – as Hone Harawira did – he is going to bugger off to Paris for a bit of sight-seeing with the missus.

In John Key’s case, he will be buggering off for a bite rather than deliver the speech.

Officials have confirmed Mr Key, who arrives in Denmark on Thursday morning, will be at dinner at the royal palace while Climate Minister Nick Smith delivers a three-minute speech on Thursday night.

Keisha should be chuffed as Key yields the high ground

Bring back Rob Muldoon.

Yep. It sounds like a heresy.

But Rob would never have apologised to Whale Rider star Keisha Castle-Hughes – as John Key has done – for suggesting she “stick to acting” rather than debate climate change issues.

The only saving grace is that The Boss didn’t dive for the photo opportunity, as Alf previously had feared, by being pictured with the somewhat skinny lass.

Let’s have a 100% reduction in hot air from Keisha

Keisha Castle-Hughes – an actress – is disinclined to take Prime Minister John Key’s advice to “stick to acting” and not publicly parade her potty opinions on climate change.

The uppity lass has gone further and invited herself to a chat with the PM.

The Whale Rider actor told Close Up last night that she would be willing to meet Mr Key to discuss the issue.

“I’d love to sit down and maybe he’d know that – if we sat down and talked – that I know a lot more about it than I think he thinks I do.”

Grounding the Greens

Alf alerts the Greens this morning to the splendid example being set by a young environmentalist based in England, who says he will never visit his parents in Taranaki again after making a no-flying pledge.

Once Michael Furey, 21, returns today to the United Kingdom he will fly no more.

It’s his personal commitment to reducing greenhouse gases which cause climate change.

And he’s on a mission to spread the word to people resistant to change.

“Once I say I’m not going to fly, it’s not an option any more,” the geography undergraduate from the University of Birmingham said.

Alf reckons this example should be followed by all the Green Party MPs, who are forever banging on about the need to reduce greenhouse gases much more than makes economic – let alone political – sense.

Michael Furey travelled by plane to Brisbane last month to attend an international Universitas 21 forum on climate change.

For two weeks, from July 12 to 24, the gathering of 120 students and lecturers, from 14 universities across the globe, discussed climate change .

“Climate change has a much greater severity than any other crisis we may face. And the lifestyle we lead is having an impact.

“I personally think we all have a responsibility to others to do something about it, ” Mr Furey said.

Alf trusts the Green MPs agree and sign similar pledges to give up flying.

Even better, they should broaden the example they set by giving up motoring, too.

But not today.

Let them think about it, then make their lifetime commitments to saving the planet, after they have returned home at the end of this week’s sittings of the House.

Giving Jim his Nobel dues

The Green Party’s persistence in describing climate scientist Jim Salinger as a Nobel Prize winner needs exploring.

Alf – uncharacteristically – might have been a tad dismissive two days ago.

At the time of the award, The NZ Herald recognised the work of Salinger (who composts his food scraps and uses energy-efficient light bulbs) and Dr David Wratt (who uses public transport and plants trees):

But the personal contributions of the Niwa climate scientists in tackling the issue of global warming go way beyond commitments to reduce their carbon footprints.

For years the pair have devoted huge amounts of time to the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which was this month awarded a Nobel Peace Prize.

The organisation shares the prize with former United States Vice-President Al Gore for his film An Inconvenient Truth, in recognition of their efforts to raise awareness and impetus around the threat of climate change.

NIWA curbs talk about the weather

Sounds like that Barmy Banana bloke – or one of the Fijian strongman’s henchmen – has taken over our National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research.

The result is the muzzling of NIWA scientists, most obviously manifest in the sacking of well known climate scientist Jim Salinger.

The story has been nudged along by Green Party expressions of outrage, although – true to form – if the Greens have a hot flush, they turn up the heat to grab a more sizzling headline. They described Salinger as a Nobel Prize winner.

Bollocks. But more of that later.

Chauvel’s caution had already been sounded

From the Labour side of the political divide comes a media statement headed “Latest NZ carbon position no cause for complacency”.

The statement was issued by Labour’s Climate Change Issues Spokesperson Charles Chauvel, who said there were four reasons why the Government’s announcement of a better-than-expected carbon emissions position should be treated with caution.

Alf was pleasantly surprised by Chauvel’s numerical skills. Obviously he misunderstood when – in a chat with mates in Bellamy’s about Labour leadership prospects – someone said Chauvel didn’t count.