Thirty seven years ago, on this day, January 12th,1989 – British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher meets with her Foreign Secretary and others to discuss climate policies-
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 382ppm. As of 2025 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The broader context was the UK is, historically, a huge polluter. Of course.
The specific context was that Thatcher had set off the “Greenhouse Effect” discussion among policy types in September 1988, with a speech to the Royal Society. (Scientists had been trying for years to alert politicians). Some (James Goldsmith etc) wanted to try to link foreign aid to reduced deforestation. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office was opposed, and eventually won the day.
What I think we can learn from this is that if you really want to know what went on, you can read the memoirs, but you just have to wait for the archives to open, without ever trusting those archives to give you a full/accurate picture.
What happened next
The proposal to tie aid to stopping deforestation did not get past its opponents, who included the FCO.
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
References
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Also on this day:
January 12, 1995 – Australian carbon tax coming??