The media is distorting the truth about the public and net zero

Two news stories in one morning, both about a report on public attitudes to net zero policy – but totally different headlines. The Scotsman leads with “UK net zero strategy 'wearing thin' with public, says report”, The Guardian goes for “Rightwing narrative fuelling false belief UK public oppose net zero, study finds”. What is happening here?

First of all, these are actually two different studies. The Scotsman is reporting on a report from academics at Strathclyde and Aberdeen Universities whereas The Guardian story is about a separate report from the IPPR. So how do these studies differ to produce such different headlines? They don't. Each has a different emphasis but they find more or less the same things.

So why the headline difference? Because one more or less proves the other. In the Scottish study the results show that there still remains very strong support for net zero policies, but that there has been a slight decline in support recently. The IPPR study shows the same thing, but doesn't see the very slight downward trend as the key issue – there are almost twice as many strong supporters of net zero than strong opponents.

It is the other aspects of the studies that explain the issue. The Scottish study looked at the issue of support through the frame of perceptions of household and community benefit. What it finds is that support for net zero remains strong but even supporters increasingly feel that the benefits are not accruing to them but to others.

This is most stark when we look at generation – communities with giant and obtrusive arrays of wind turbines and, for many, particularly the even more intrusive mega-pylons that support the cabling which distribute the energy, but who receive almost no gain or compensation for this.

But we also see it in people who are not seeing their energy bills reduce – despite renewables being significantly cheaper than gas for producing electricity, the entire UK grid is still priced in gas prices, enabling renewable energy profiteering. The ‘throwing away’ of energy via constraint payments is another gripe for many. We pay through our bills for them to not generate electricity.

The IPPR study looks at something else; it is seeking to establish the relationship between public attitudes to and media coverage of net zero. What it finds is a very major disconnect – because our media is dominated by right-wing print titles, the coverage of net zero has been very largely negative. That does not reflect public attitudes at all.

The Scotsman has taken a consistently pro-oil and gas approach and has published articles with climate change-denying conspiracy theories. It is not misreporting this study, but it is demonstrating precisely the findings of the other study – that the slant given in the media is consistently at odds with public attitudes.

There are some very clear learning points from these studies if pro-net zero politicians are interested in learning them. The first and most important for Scotland is to stop taking net zero sentiment for granted. Yes it is strong, but that doesn't mean that those who hold positive net zero views do not want to see personal benefit as well.

That is about public ownership, stronger community benefit clauses and reform of the obtuse pricing mechanisms used across the UK energy grid and investing in energy storage. It also means a willingness to work with communities in planning.

But it is also another alarm call about the assumption of who gets to shape and control democracy. The relentless drive to the right in the UK media has been driven by billionaire owners purchasing or using news outlets to pursue political goals. They are becoming like unregistered, unregulated lobbyists.

Common Weal has argued for years that freedom of the press just means the freedom of the rich to control information, whereas freedom of journalism reflects the public's right to hear reporting that oligarchs don't want you to hear.

We have consistently argued that both to boost the volume of journalism in Scotland and to rebalance the politics of the media away from the views of anyone with wealth and right-wing views, we need publicly-funded journalism.

Net zero challenges the interests of wealth and so wealth has been using media ownership to run a campaign against net zero. It isn't really working, but it is working enough, and the corporate-dominated roll-out of net zero is leaving far too much ammunition for critics to work on.

The politicians are not leading on this issue but following. They must be more aware of the risks of being passive and learn the lessons of these studies.