Who are the Net Zero Scrutiny Group? This small group of Tory MPs was set up by Craig Mackinlay in the summer of 2021. It currently numbers around 20 MPs, and states that "it accepts the fundamental facts of the climate emergency and the need to reduce emissions”, but claims that the government’s net-zero plans are “too bold, dreamed up by out-of-touch elites, and would impoverish working people, ‘making them colder and poorer’”. Strange that the voting record of many in the group includes supporting measures that impoverish poorer people, which would suggest that their motives are less than altruistic.
They are trying to “link the government’s net-zero agenda to the cost-of-living crisis”, and are calling for “cuts to green taxes and an increase of fossil fuel production”. Actually the cost of living crisis has its roots in Conservative austerity policies and their failure to reduce GB's reliance on oil and gas. Investment in renewable energies and better home insulation, both of which would have contributed to a huge reduction in fossil fuel use and at the same time created thousands of sustainable jobs, has been pitiful, and dwarfed by the huge subsidies given to fossil fuel industries.
The NZSG has strong links to the Global Warming Policy Foundation, a "prominent publisher of material questioning the consensus on climate science”. Founded by the Tory chancellor Nigel Lawson, a climate-change sceptic, the Foundation outputs the minority views of the very small number of scientists who are sceptical about climate change and has received funding from fossil fuel companies.
The NZSG has parallels (and a membership overlap) with the BREXIT supporting European Research Group, and their tactics have similarities, including the repeated dissemination of 'facts' that are not evidence-based.