Ofcom was yesterday accused of an 'Orwellian' assault on free speech after launching probes into alleged climate-sceptic comments for the first time in almost a decade.
The media regulator originally decided not to investigate complaints over remarks about climate change on two programmes aired by TV channel Talk last year.
But it announced a dramatic U-turn after being lobbied by pro-transgender rights and climate activist campaign group the Good Law Project (GLP).
One complaint related to comments made by a Talk guest who said on a programme in November that climate change 'was a deliberate effort to create fake anxiety... out of something that is false'.
In the second case, also in November, another guest said Labour's energy policies were 'suicidal', 'driven by pseudoscience in many cases' and 'a kind of cultish behaviour'.
On one of the programmes, a UK Health Security Agency report into the potential mental health impacts of concerns about climate change was being discussed alongside the Government's messaging over the issue.
The other featured a discussion relating to the potential impact of climate change and Net Zero policies on the UK population.
After the GLP wrote to Ofcom in January asking it to justify its initial ruling not to investigate, the regulator U-turned. It said a potential breach of rules of the broadcasting code around 'due impartiality' and 'material misleadingness' required 'reconsideration'.
One complaint being investigated by Ofcom centres on comments made about Labour's energy and Net Zero policies on the Morning Glory with Jeremy Kyle programme in December
Ofcom announced a U-turn on its initial decision not to investigate two complaints after being lobbied by the Good Law Project, founded by Jolyon Maugham KC
It also launched a probe into a new complaint over comments made about Labour's energy and Net Zero policies on the Morning Glory with Jeremy Kyle programme in December.
The three probes are the first the broadcasting regulator has launched into alleged climate-sceptic comments on television and radio since 2017.
Ofcom stuck by its decision not to investigate complaints about climate comments on three other programmes.
Tory peer Lord Mackinlay of Richborough added: 'Ofcom runs the risk of becoming an Orwellian 'Ministry of Truth' - truly dangerous ground in a supposed democratic society. 'All science evolves and should be given the free space to do so. 'Even the BBC is undertaking a 'thematic review' of its own climate reporting, acknowledging excessive and hyperbolic alarmism. 'As a libertarian Conservative I take a simplistic view of broadcasting output -if I don't like what I'm listening to or watching, I simply turn it off. 'We should perhaps do the same to Ofcom, saving millions of pounds on the closure of this unloved, out of control quango.'According to the Guardian, Ofcom has received 1,221 complaints related to climate change since January 2020, with none resulting in a ruling that the broadcasting code was breached.
The GLP, a not-for-profit campaign organisation founded by Jolyon Maugham KC, has previously attacked the Labour Government over its climate and Net Zero policies, saying they don't go far enough.
In an online post in November threatening to initiate legal action against the Government's 'climate failure', it said: '[Keir] Starmer's climate framework is so full of holes that it breaches our right to family life.'
It has also tried to frustrate a landmark court judgement by the Supreme Court last year that the words 'woman' and 'sex' in the Equality Act 2010 referred to a biological woman.
It unsuccessfully challenged the Equality and Human Rights Commission in the courts last month after the rights watchdog posted guidance online that trans women 'should not be permitted to use the women's facilities' in workplaces or public-facing services such as shops and hospitals following the Supreme Court ruling.
The GLP has tried to claim that ministers must reject guidance submitted by the EHRC to the Government on protecting single-sex spaces.
A spokesman said: 'Right-wing channels have been allowed to spout dangerous climate lies, unchecked, for too long.We're glad Ofcom is finally listening and await the conclusion of the investigations.'Should it fail to take action against Talk's misinformation, we will not hesitate to hold them to account.' They added:<'It's time Ofcom took action to stop fossil fuel propaganda from dominating media coverage.'An Ofcom spokesman said:<'In re-examining the programmes, we concluded that they raise potentially substantive issues under the broadcasting code which warrant investigation.
We have, therefore, opened investigations [on] whether they breached our rules on due impartiality and material misleadingness.'A Talk spokesman said:<'We, as we always would, will cooperate with Ofcom in these matters.'