So now we have a choice between a scheme for the enrichment of bankers and a scheme for the enrichment of lawyers. I wonder how those who actually care about the environment feel about it becoming such a popular mainstream issue/opportunity?

Ah yes the "university" of Buckingham. Another link in the world-wide network of let the market rule ideology factories---there is only me and my immediate self-interest.

Yawn.... yet another ignoramus who has credulously swallowed the soundbites offered by denialist blogs and who has evidently failed to bother to learn the basics of contemporary climate science.

Handwaving conspiracy theories accompanied by a series of spectacular logical fallacies... in a word, pathetic.

Thank you Graham, for this refreshing prescription, where choice and societies ability to solve problems at an affordable price will benefit all and therefore does not adversely engineer the destruction of family and individual property rights or tax the community into subsistence.

This article almost makes it imperative that anyone commenting should spend $20 and buy State of Fear by Michael Crichton, a fictional story based in the United States where lawyers were manipulating the climate change hysteria, for private gain.

Climate Change is just one of the manipulations of the system for private gain lawyers have indulged themselves in. The biggest fraud is the transmogrification of the legal system from a civil system with full community participation as a jury, into a communist military system, as used by any occupying army, where members of the community are excluded and all decisions are made by Officers of the occupying forces. We won World War II but lost the peace to a sixth column of lawyers, whose empire has expanded exponentially since 1953.

By 1995 the federal Labor Party had identified the problem, and made legislation to control these home grown terrorists, and called it the Criminal Code Act 1995 ( Cth). Unfortunately the Liberals beat them in 1996, in March and did not proclaim the legislation until the 16th October 2001. Then they instructed the Australian Federal Police to ignore it and not to prosecute offenders. To date they have prosecuted no one. It is time they started. S 268:10 makes it a crime carrying twenty five years imprisonment to make slaves of people, and 268:12 makes it a crime for Judges and Magistrates to find guilt without a jury, and sentence anyone except on a jury verdict.

Senator Fielding is an engineer, and he is asking the same questions, and it is time we seriously looked at the forced nationalization of all property in Australia by the State Governments, and the exercise of illegal judicial power by them. If you choose to look at this website, http://www.community-law.info/ you will see a collection of documents including Kidman, Kable, Lane and Pape, decisions from the High Court that detail the extent of this lawyers scam.

Australia was a common law country and we have had no referendum changing that. Its time the lawyers in Australia woke up to themselves, and admitted their mistakes.

What an obscene load of steaming horse sh!t. This is a GLOBAL problem. Who/where will the people of Tuvalu or Bangladesh sue? The ICC? How will they be able to pay for it.

Your simplistic and idiotic idea is great for the rich west (who caused all the problems) but not so good for poor countries.

You conflate your obsession with individualism into some sort of fantasy world where everyone is equally able to defend themselves via the so called justice system.

Your unbelievably ridiculous suggestion that if A damages B's property they can sue completely ignores the fact that it is ALL of us damaging each others property to some extent. If you use electricity, cars, buy things etc etc you are contributing. How can such contributions be measured and then litigated against? It is just frankly an insane and totally weird argument that you are making and I think you are just spewing sh!t to try and cloud the issue as much as possible. Typical neocon spiv.

Another blinkered, dogma driven, right wing fool who thinks rich people can do no wrong and that anything that interferes with their pursuit of money is a socialist plot. You people suck and the sooner the rest of us stand up to you and your greedy ilk the sooner this world can progress and prosper.

mikk, as ever, love your work.

You nailed the problem Mikk.

And if we do manage to clean up our act, (and I know this is uncharitable) but the Graeme Dawsons of the world will still benefit.

Dawson has at least the right aim in getting a balanced view on climate change into the public domain.
The IPCC dominates all and the debate has become so distorted that claims that its forecasts are peer reviewed are not only accepted - in spite of glaring evidence that the panel's process is emphatically not proper peer review - but taken as some sort of authentication or validation of its forecasts.
There is nothing that can be described an an independent check or audit of the IPCC's work, but even if there was you don't peer review forecasts. You make them and hope that they are somewhere close to reality.
However, Dawson's suggestions are unlikely to do anything more than enrich the lawyers and clog up the court rooms. In other words, make more of a mess than the existing legislation. Shame but there it is..

The author gets a gold star for out of the box thinking, which we desperately need in the Climate Change debate - since one side of the debate has decided there is no other side.

People should be encouraged to share their opinions on different perspectives and not denigrated for not complying with one view or another.

Out of many such ideas we might get a mix of alternative directions.

Many in the AGW believe it or burn in hell (you vile Plimerphile, denier!) camp just turn off immediately and reach for the insult and denigration dictionary whenever anything is proposed that is contrary to their beliefs.

I for one welcome all points of view, whether they are agreeable or not, to my reasoning.

I'm not a lawyer, (I don't mean to brag), and while I'm not sure this is workable, or helpful. It does float the idea of forcing the exagerations and claims of all sides of the debate to be brought under closer and more honest inspection, and that I welcome.

Oh yes Mr Dawson “tort law.” That’s the style of litigation that was used by the plaintiffs against Exxon Oil and their ship ahoy, Valdez, with its drunken sailor at the helm, who trashed Prince William Sound’s ecosystems in Alaska. Twenty years of tort law and one appeal after another is petty cash to Exxon though isn’t it?

Twenty years on, the plaintiffs have yet to receive any punitive damages after losing their livelihoods (20% of plaintiffs have carked it) and Prince William Sound remains in recovery mode. Many marine life in recovery mode also but not a herring to be seen yet and the Orcas have looked elsewhere for a feed.

Too bad for the herring or the Orcas but none of this really matters though. Remember, what's important here is the health of Exxon. God forbid they are found responsible for ruining an entire ecosystem. Keep in mind if that happened it would effect shareholder confidence and Exxon's record profits.

May we pause a moment in silence and pray for Exxon. God bless Exxon and all that wonderful pollution they’ve given us plus a lovely heated planet! Sign of the Cross: “Spectacles, testicles, wallet and watch.....and Amen to that!”

Thank you Mr Dawson.

protagoras 1, dawson 0