The latest vote…

Robert Courts Watch turned out in downtown Witney on New Year’s Day to open a pivotal new year in style. With our banner trimmed in tinsel and our pockets full of leaflets, we stood and engaged with the Witney public. Our focus was an existentially important challenge to Robert Courts, our MP, relating in particular to the Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill. This menacing Bill was to receive its second reading on January 8th and we called on Robert not to vote in its support. (In the event, this second reading was postponed to January 22nd and has now happened.)

Cognitive dissonance, spin and disinformation.

Robert is in a state of extreme cognitive dissonance on climate issues. He’s holding two utterly incompatible ideas in his head. He declaims the right idea in the constituency but succumbs to the wrong idea in Westminster lobbies, when he votes. The first idea (the right one) is that climate change is true. He agrees that the scientific consensus around climate is solid. He accepts the findings of authorities such as the UK’s independent statutory Climate Change Committee (CCC), the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA).

Robert tells us that he understands that climate change is happening now and that it is caused by fossil fuels. He tells us that global warming is “existentially significant” and therefore “unquestionably the most important issue of our times.”

In other words, he knows that climate change is already here and that it is extraordinarily dangerous. And yet his government is pushing the Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill through parliament right now, with his support! This Bill will require that we license more fossil fuel drilling every year. That we ‘max out’ oil and gas reserves willy-nilly and at all costs.

This mad max-out approach is the second idea (the wrong one) which drives his parliamentary behaviour. These two ideas fundamentally contradict each other, so at best Mr Courts is in a state of cognitive dissonance - at worst he’s spreading partisan spin and disinformation.

It’s got to stop! It’s time for honest politics, based in reality and telling the truth.

We can’t reach net zero 2050 and also burn all our fossil fuel reserves! This is a simple, mathematical fact. It’s the truth. And the two Conservative MPs who are real experts on climate, Chris Skidmore and Alok Sharma, both defied their party’s whips and spoke out clearly against the Bill. They did this because they understand that it requires us to do the exact opposite of what we should be doing and is therefore very wrong and very dangerous. They acted with their consciences, on principle, and in the light of truth.

But Robert voted for the Offshore Petroleum Licensing Bill. This is a direct, frontal attack on the interests of his constituents – on us. It’s playing Russian Roulette with our future. We know that fossil fuel ‘business as usual’ will collapse our weather, our economy, and civilisation itself in the end. This is what all the climate data tells us. It’s a scientific truth. However, Robert voted with his government to insist on drilling, notwithstanding – voting against all informed advice and all the evidence.

It matters acutely because 2024 will be a pivotal year - probably the last chance we have to deal with climate change and keep the world safely liveable. But Robert is complacent. There’s a lack of urgency and a reluctance to use the power of government to force the pace and make change happen. He repeats the mantra that Britain is “world-beating” and claims that we still have time to wait for, and rely on, the market (perhaps) to save us - that we can afford to dawdle and dilute action on climate.

None of this is true and all of it is dangerous!

We’re in a menacing climate emergency (which Robert’s government declared!) but the solution is clear: We’ve got to stop drilling for new fossil fuels right now and we’ve got to speed up our transition to low carbon alternatives starting immediately. It’s doable, affordable and economically desirable.

Robert’s vote to rush on blindly down the fossil fuel dead end makes a dreadful start to the new year. When this appalling bill reappears for its third reading, we implore him to honour his understanding of the realities of climate change. We beseech him to listen to the experts beside him on the green benches and those outside parliament. We urge him to follow the science and vote against all new fossil fuel licences from now on, in the true interests of his constituents.