One of the brighter and more thought provoking new Tory bloggers
on the block is Richard Willis. He stood is Sutton & Cheam last
time and is a Reading Borough Councillor. Today he has written a
provocative blogpost asserting that Margaret Thatcher was the
original climate change pioneer. Thatcher, who got her degree in
chemistry in 1947 from Oxford and went on to work as a research
chemist before becoming a tax lawyer and, eventually, a
politician, gave her first documented speech mentioning climate
change at the Royal Society in 1988, almost a decade into her
11-year reign as Prime Minister. She told the assembled
scientists that three changes in atmospheric chemistry 1.
greenhouse gases, 2. the hole in the ozone layer and 3. acid
emissions from power plants, warranted not just good science to
resolve uncertainties but also government action to diminish
pollution and promote sustainable development. She said: “Even
though this kind of action may cost a lot, I believe it to be
money well and necessarily spent