Ministers accused of 'misleading' public over emissions success

Data published this year fell short of the government's code of practice, says statistics watchdog chief
Press Association
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 21 October 2009 13.32 BST
Ministers were accused of exaggerating Britain's success in fighting climate change today. The government's statistics watchdog said figures on carbon dioxide emissions could "mislead" the public.
Sir Michael Scholar, chairman of the UK Statistics Authority, said presentation of the data by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) was "unsatisfactory".
In a letter to Tim Yeo, the chairman of the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee, he said a statistical bulletin released in February "fell short" of the government's code of practice. Scholar raised serious concerns about the claim that CO2 emissions had fallen by 12.8% compared to 1990 levels.
But nearly a third of that fall is made up of carbon credits purchased by polluters in an EU trading scheme and do not represent actual cuts in UK emissions. Without the credits, the fall is a much more modest 8.5%. Scholar said ministers should in future include a clearer explanation of how the figures are calculated.
He said: "In this case, the figures mentioned are, in our view, likely to be used by non-expert observers to judge progress in reducing CO2 emissions within the UK.
"We regard the quoted figures, and particularly the percentage change, as unsatisfactory in the context of that use."
Yeo said the figures were not being used in a "straightforward way" and called on ministers to put right the problem "as soon as possible".
"The committee has had some concerns about this presentation for some time so I'm not surprised by this," he said. "It's very important if the government is going to maintain the confidence of the public and the green lobby that they should be absolutely objective and straightforward about it.
"It's a very complex area and there are already a number of confusions surrounding claims about emissions reductions."