Watch in agony – and then enjoy as Sky News gets horribly ratioed for an excruciatingly embarrassing piece of eco-propaganda it posted on Twitter.

For over a hundred years, the UK released more carbon than any other nation. This has left the UK with the world's fifth highest carbon debt. Watch our special report on the climate crisis here: https://t.co/L0T7VuyGdd pic.twitter.com/53hht3HnZR — Sky News (@SkyNews) June 25, 2019

Only 400 retweets at the time of writing – but 1,500 comments, mostly from Twitter users aghast that a vaguely reputable news channel should squander its resources on the kind of eco-tosh so fantastically lame it might have been scripted by a 16-year old autistic kid in pigtails.

Headlined ‘Our carbon debt’, the short video tries to reposition the Industrial Revolution – the single greatest leap in living standards in the history of the world – as a terrible mistake for which we should now make amends.

It begins:

“In the 18th Century the Industrial Revolution kickstarted economic growth and modern capitalism – but only at the cost of pumping out millions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere as the years ticked on by…”

Then it shows how much various countries including Britain, the USA, and, latterly, China have contributed to global CO2 output in the years since.

“…with scientists predicting a climate catastrophe and with China pumping ever more pollution into the atmosphere, the greater the challenge of the next century is going to be managing this Carbon Debt. The Debt that Britain started.”

Fortunately, not many of the people watching this outrageous guff appear to be convinced that the revolution which brought higher life expectancy, better living standards and prosperity to millions is something we should seek to undo.

Here is a taste of the comments:

"Carbon debt" Carbon in atmosphere been falling since photosynthesis began. Mostly sequestered away as limestone, with some fossil fuel. CO2 fell to 180ppm in the last glaciation. When it's down to 150ppm it really will be in "debt". Because plants die and so will we. pic.twitter.com/lKlCTxEyWg — Jack Eddyfier (@swcrisis) June 26, 2019

If only we hadn’t industrialised and stayed living in squalor we wouldn’t have had to watch your ridiculous report — Mike (@brynybrath) June 25, 2019

I'm here for the ratio. — Odif Yltsaeb (@odif_yltsaeb) June 26, 2019

Sure some volcanoes going off might have helped….

Carbon debt….ffs pic.twitter.com/2UgEMZEm7E — Andrew Hood (@andyhood0) June 25, 2019

Yes. Damn us Brts for bringing upon the developed world where we can cure diseases, live comfortably and give to the poor. — Ch90t (@Ch90t1) June 26, 2019

The response seems to confirm that, on climate change, there is a massive gulf of understanding between the mainstream media and the general public. While Sky News, the BBC and many newspapers now take it for granted that climate change represents a major threat and that we are now facing a so-called ‘planetary emergency’, the audience which they claim to serve is much more sanguine and sceptical on these issues.

This, in turn, raises questions about the wisdom of the political class’s position on climate change, which currently appears to presuppose that the electorate is as hungry for climate action as campaigners like the Prince of Wales, George Monbiot and Greta Thunberg. Hence parliament’s recent signing of the £1 trillion suicide note committing the UK economy to 100 percent decarbonisation – aka Net Zero – by 2050: something to which it might well have given more thought if it hadn’t assumed that that pretty much the entire UK population was made up of drooling, hair-shirt eco-loons determined to bomb the economy back to the ages because polar bears.