Peter Lilley, a climate change sceptic and oil company director, has been appointed to the House of Commons energy and climate change select committee.

Lilley was one of only three MPs to vote against the Climate Change Act in 2008. He is also vice-chairman and senior independent non-executive director of Tethys Petroleum Ltd, an oil and gas company with operations in Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

The 11-member committee is appointed by the Commons to examine the expenditure, administration and policy of the Department of Energy and Climate Change and its associated public bodies.

In a parliamentary debate in 2009, the Conservative MP for Hitchin and Harpenden said: "The simple fact is that the science [behind climate change] is not resolved."

Lilley, who was a cabinet minister in the Thatcher and Major governments, has repeatedly criticised economist Nicholas Stern's six-year-old report into the economic impact of climate change, which warned the costs of doing nothing to prevent global warming would be devastating.

In a report published last month, What is wrong with Stern?, the MP claimed the Stern report "was not fit for purpose" and called on the government to adopt more gradual reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

He claimed that while Stern's conclusions were considered "incontrovertible truth" six years ago, "the mood has changed since the recession".

• This article was amended on 25 October 2012 to say that Lilley was one of only three - not five - MPs to vote against the act.