End this obsession over climate change: It stops us tackling floods and storms now say experts



Climate experts from the University of Manchester argue that flood defences must be given greater priority



They claim the Government is too focused on reducing greenhouse gases, which will never eliminate devastating floods

Senior politicians have clamoured in recent months to link Britain’s devastating floods to global warming

Obsessing over climate change is distracting politicians from dealing with floods and storms, experts warned yesterday.

Trying to link all extreme weather to man-made global warming ‘has been a social and policy disaster’, they said.

Instead, the focus should shift towards dealing with the impact of fierce weather, which will happen regardless of climate change, argued David Schultz and Vladimir Jankovic.

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Scientists from the University of Manchester said climate change is distracting politicians from dealing with storms, when they should be trying to bolster flood defenses after seeing the effects of an incredibly wet winter. A man canoeing along the flood water in Timsway in Staines, London this February is pictured

The academics from the University of Manchester said flood defences must be given greater priority to avoid a repeat of the impact of this winter’s storms.

In a paper published last night, they said the Government was too focused on cutting greenhouse gases, which was crucial but would never eliminate devastating floods or powerful tidal surges.

Senior politicians have been eager to link Britain’s severe floods to global warming.

The Prime Minister said man-made climate change was ‘one of the most serious threats’ the country faced and that he ‘very much suspected’ it caused the floods in Somerset and along the Thames Valley.

Labour leader Ed Miliband has described global warming as ‘an issue of national security’ which would bring ‘more flooding, more storms’.

And UN executive Christiana Figueres prompted fury when she said the floods had a ‘silver lining’ as they forced climate change on to the political agenda.

But Professor Schultz, an expert in meteorology, and Dr Jankovic, a climate historian, said that it was almost impossible to link any one weather event to global warming.

David Cameron (pictured left) told Parliament that man-made climate change is ‘one of the most serious threats’ the country faces, and that he ‘very much suspects’ it caused the recent flooding, while Ed Miliband (right) called global warming ‘an issue of national security’ that would bring ‘more flooding, more storms’



WHAT POLITICIANS HAVE SAID ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE FLOODS

Senior politicians have clamoured in recent months to link Britain’s devastating floods to global warming.

David Cameron told Parliament that man-made climate change is ‘one of the most serious threats’ the country faces, and that he ‘very much suspects’ it caused the recent disaster.

Labour leader Ed Miliband called global warming ‘an issue of national security’ that would bring ‘more flooding, more storms’.

UN climate chief Christiana Figueres sparked fury when she said the floods had a ‘silver lining’ because they forced the issue of climate change onto the political agenda.

Trying to do so was ‘a distraction’, they wrote in the journal Weather, Climate and Society.

Linking ‘climate change and high-impact weather events, although an interesting scientific question, has been a social and policy disaster’, they added.

‘The over-emphasis on “was this associated with climate change?” distracts from the issue that weather happens whether or not climate change is occurring.

‘For most purposes, any change due to climate change is a less immediate concern than the impact of the weather itself.

'Society ought to do its best to protect the planet but society should also protect itself against weather disasters.’

Politicians wrongly thought cutting greenhouse gas emissions should be the main response, the authors said.

They said this was important but governments should also focus on measures such as building flood defences. But Bob Ward, policy director at the London School of Economics Grantham Institute said talking about climate change was vital.

‘Frankly it is dangerous to suggest that all we need to do is make ourselves resilient to weather extremes,’ he added.

It was important ‘the public understands climate change is already occurring and the scale of the risk is huge’, he said.

David Schulz and Vladimir Jankovi, climate experts from the University of Manchester, argue that flood defences must be given priority if the huge impact of this winter's storms are not to be repeated. Flood defences being built in Cockermouth, Cumbria are pictured in 2009 after water inundated parts of the town

Dr Saleemul Huq, of the International Institute for Environment and Development, agreed extreme weather was likely with or without climate change.

‘But I also think there is a strong case that such events may become more extreme due to climate change,’ he added.

The Manchester paper comes a week before the latest report from the UN on climate change. Leaked drafts predict that the changing climate will cause severe flooding globally.

Chancellor George Osborne announced an extra £140million for flood schemes in his Budget but this was dismissed as grossly insufficient by engineers.