UEA spent £112,000 on managing Climategate media storm

The university spent over £100,000 combating the international ‘climategate’ media storm in 2009.

The "scandal" broke out in November 2009 following the leak of thousands of emails which supposedly showed data had been manipulated in favour of man-made climate change.

Climategate turned out to be a lot of hot air and nothing came of it.

But the university decided to hire PR experts to help combat the media hurricane at the time, which led to a consultancy called Outside Organisation taking control.

The managing director of the PR firm, Neil Wallis, went on to be arrested in July 2011 and bailed without charge as part of the ongoing police investigation into phone hacking due to previously being the deputy editor of the News of the World.

Now a Freedom of Information request has found that the university spent £112,870 hiring Outside Organisation.

The UEA had tried to resist releasing the FOI request, citing the commercial interests and confidentiality of Outside Organisation, but the Information Commissioner’s Office disagreed and the figure has now been released.

UEA vice-chancellor, Prof Edward Acton, said: “I sought communications advice from a large PR company to address the distortion and misinformation still rife in the wake of the unauthorised publication of emails hacked from the Climatic Research Unit.

“The company assigned Neil Wallis and another colleague to us for this purpose.

“No university would have had the capacity to deal with the media storm to which we were subjected and it would have been irresponsible not to have mobilised additional assistance to defend our reputation and to safeguard colleagues whose reputations were also at risk.

“Given the momentous issues at stake and the need to focus on them while continuing to support essential communications activity to our schools and faculties, I believe that we took the right decision in bringing in external advice.”

UEA statement said: “The Outside Organisation provided consultancy services on all aspects of our engagement with the media and with the broadcast enquiries at which senior members of the university were witnesses.”