by Damian Carrington, The Guardian, Environment Blog, October 27, 2010

Prof Phil Jones told the University of East Anglia's boss that he did not delete any of the emails that were released from the university last November, despite apparently saying he would in one of those emails. That was only new thing I learned this morning in a torpid 90 minutes of questioning by MPs on the House of Commons science and technology committee.

In front of them were Sir Muir Russell, author of the independent report on "climategate," Prof Edward Acton, vice-chancellor at UEA, and Prof Trevor Davies, pro-vice chancellor for research and former head of the Climatic Research unit. But for all the heat generated in the past by the release of the emails between the CRU scientists – used to allege, wrongly, that climate science was fundamentally flawed – there was little spark today.

The MPs, including the climate sceptic Graham Stringer, were unaggressive and seemed to be going through the motions. The panel wrangled each question to the ground with mind-bending detail. It felt like watching mechanics stripping down a car you like to drive, when you really don't want to know how it works.

One passage did stand out. Stringer asked Russell why he didn't ask Jones if he had deleted any relevant emails, which would contravene the UK's Freedom of Information law. "That would have been asking did you commit a crime, which would have taken the inquiry to completely different territory," Russell said, including having to ask the questions under caution.

But Acton said he had asked Jones, and his CRU colleague Keith Briffa, if they had inappropriately deleted emails. "They said they had never deleted emails deliberately," Acton said.

The committee chair, Andrew Mitchell, had opened the session saying the intention was to "try to tie up some loose ends and bottom out apparent criticism in the evidence we have gathered." They tried.

Criticisms from sceptics Andrew Montford, David Holland and Doug Keenan were all aired, including how the scientific papers considered by a separate review by Lord Oxburgh were chosen and whether the CRU scientists acted against the peer review rules of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. None flustered the panellists and frequently the debate plunged into the semantics of single words.

Did the Oxburgh review change its terms of reference? It depends what you mean by "science." Did Jones intentionally delete emails he should not have? It depends what you mean by "attempt."

Is this the end of the saga? If this is the level of detail that remains to be debated, I really hope so.

What remains clear to me is that:

• The fundamental conclusion of climate scientists stands -- that greenhouse gases from human activities are warming the planet to dangerous levels
• The CRU scientists did not respond properly to FoI requests
• Muir Russell's report found no evidence to support the allegation that CRU scientists failed to act properly in the peer reviewing they did, but the language of some of the emails remains acutely embarrassing.

Link:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2010/oct/27/hacked-uea-emails-cru