The GWPF tries to claim that it is a charity, but has regularly been accused of breaching charity commission guidelines by accepting donations from oil and gas interests and also for breaching charity rules on impartiality.
A climate denial think-tank, the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), which describes itself as an ‘educational charity’, has had to cut loose its campaigning arm after an investigation by the Charity Commission.
The GWPF tries to claim that it is a charity, but has regularly been accused of breaching charity commission guidelines by accepting donations from oil and gas interests and also for breaching charity rules on impartiality, publishing material which promotes climate science denial.
The Tufton Street based think-tank was founded by former Tory chancellor Lord Lawson who himself has previously claimed that ‘global warming is not a problem’.
The latest developments come after the Good Law Project supported a cross-party group of MPs to lodge a complaint with the commission about the GWPF.
The Good Law Project says that the GWPF is set up as an educational charity, but its complaint presented evidence showing it had breached charity law many times, spending thousands of pounds on one-sided research downplaying the climate crisis, and investing in Net Zero Watch – a climate denial campaigning group.
The group states: “GWPF’s “educational” outputs include claims that hot weather in 2022 was “not alarming” that coral reefs are “not declining” and bizarre statements from their directors and trustees claiming global warming is “likely to be beneficial” or denying that the planet is warming. Their Director Benny Peiser assured us in 2019 that he didn’t “see any problem in the foreseeable future”.
After concerns were raised regarding links between GWPF and Net Zero Watch the commission said a plan for the think-tank to “end its ownership” of the subsidiary is “an appropriate further step”.
The change will mean that GWPF will be unable to ‘funnel charitable funding into climate disinformation’.
However, the Charity Commission has decided not impose any sanctions on the charity and also accepted claims by trustees that it had not accepted donations from the energy industry or anyone with a significant interest in an energy company.
The Good Law Project states: “These declarations fly in the face of investigations showing that GWPF received money from a foundation holding shares in fossil fuel companies, as well as a Tory peer with investments in BP, Shell and TotalEnergies.”
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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