Climate Change and SustainableEnergy Bill

Again, the hon. Gentleman has made an assertion based on the work of the intergovernmental panel on climate change. Since he places such emphasis on that organisation’s work, I hope that he therefore accepts the findings of its draft 2007 report, which is available on the internet, which states:"““Even if greenhouse gases level off now, warming will continue at about the current rate for several decades.””" That is new information since we started this debate on 24 March. The consequence of that statement is that warming is inevitable and unavoidable for several decades, which surely makes the case stronger for investing in combating the consequences of warming rather than engaging in a futile attempt to prevent it in the first place. A second change since 24 March was the publication of a letter from 41 distinguished international scientists in The Sunday Telegraph on 23 April, which is St. George’s day—perhaps my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle was celebrating St. George’s day on 23 April and did not see it. The letter stated:"““Global climate changes all the time due to natural causes and the human impact still remains impossible to distinguish from this natural ‘noise’””." The scientists also noted:"““observational evidence does not support today’s computer climate models, so there is little reason to trust model predictions of the future.””"