Why the ‘Me Too’ movement should be a warning to those being deceitful about climate change

“A couple of decades ago, it was considered pretty normal by many celebrities that every now and then a bit of groping went on,” Mike Berners-Lee tells me. “Now, it is pretty clear to every BBC personality it would be the end of your career — and if you were found to have stood by while someone else was getting up to it, you would also be in very hot water.”

This is not the turn of conversation I was expecting when I began my interview over a video call with Berners-Lee, a professor at Lancaster University in the north of England and founder and director of Small World Consulting, about his latest book. Indeed, he suggests I may not want to include the analogy in my piece, but it illustrates perfectly the point he is making, as well as his straight-talking attitude.