Back in the day, when I was tasked with the job of ensuring my work colleagues were fully compliant with all the relevant corporate standards, my life was defined by a constant, soul-destroying battle to persuade others to treat attention to detail as seriously as I did. Often enough, this resulted in aggreived accusations of pedantry, but sometimes the detail really did matter. Take, for example, the time I discovered that my boss had deemed it acceptable that the corridor leading to the fire escape should be blocked by forty homeless boxes of highly flammable archived documentation. With my health and safety hat on, I was quick to recognise the risk that this small detail represented. So, understandably, I was keen to ensure that it featured in the latest office health and safety risk assessment submitted to my supreme leader. However, upon being handed the report, he seemed less than impressed. “Thank you very much,” he replied in a tone rinsed of all sincerity, “because, now you’ve committed that to print, I have to do something about it!” Success at last, I thought – but only until I discovered that it is in fact much easier for a managing director to remove his health and safety manager than it is to remove forty boxes of archived documentation.

I didn’t tell you this in order to gain your sympathy (although if it were offered, I wouldn’t complain). I did it instead to make an important point before going on to describe how climate change concerns have gripped the world of corporate standards. The problem is that such standards, and the sensibilities that lie behind them, achieve at best a tenuous influence over the thoughts and actions of your average, self-made captain of industry. But that still won’t stop the bureaucratic juggernaut.

Take, for example, ISO 14001, the ‘gold standard’ for corporate environmental management systems. It wasn’t my boss’s sudden appetite for sustainability and a corporate concern for the environment that led to my company’s attainment of ISO 14001 certification. It was instead my own realisation that our main customer, the UK government, had plans to introduce a requirement that any supplier or private sector subcontractor wishing to bid for future government work should hold such certification. Alpha gorilla didn’t have to spare one precious moment of his time to address that problem, because yours truly could be relied upon to recognise it and deal with it, leaving him to address more important problems, such as how to get around the ISO 14001 environmental management system once it had been established. And these things have a way of flowing downwards. The government insisted that our own subcontracting arrangements should include the same contractual requirements, and so the misery of setting up corporate governance paraphernalia that no one really wants could be passed on all the way down to the bottom of the supply chain.

Be that as it may, I have noticed of late that life has been getting even harder for your average, feckless executive whose preference is to leave the small detail of addressing the government’s demands for environmental management and climate change mitigation to the minions. And it is all because of the activities of a reasonably obscure bureaucrat from Rotherham.

The other day I got to wondering who was the world’s most famous Nigel Croft (yes, retirement really has left me with an awful lot of time on my hands). And so, I looked it up and found that Nigel Howard Croft is a former chairman of the ISO Joint Technical Coordination Group for Management System Standards. During his tenure, he oversaw the deployment of the ISO London Declaration on Climate Action. In particular, Nigel was instrumental in the introduction of ISO Guide 84:2020, a guide written for the benefit of those who are tasked with writing ISO standards. It turns out that people who write such standards have to meet certain expectations, and these include ensuring that climate change is appropriately considered. In the words of the London Declaration:

ISO Guide 84 helps standards developers integrate climate considerations at every stage—planning, drafting, and updating. It provides tools for assessing climate impacts, ensuring standards reduce emissions and enhance resilience. By promoting resource efficiency, low-carbon solutions, and long-term climate adaptation, Guide 84 supports the development of standards that drive sustainable, climate-resilient growth.

Let me just leave you for a moment to let that sink in.

Okay, time’s up. What it means is that not just the environmental standards but every ISO standard becomes a potential mechanism for forcing organisations to sign up to the climate change action behemoth. In the words of Guide 84:

This document is intended for developers of ISO standards and other deliverables to encourage the inclusion of provisions in standards to address climate change impacts, risks and opportunities, and aims to:

— enable standards committees to determine if the standard under consideration should take into account aspects, issues, impacts, risks and/or opportunities associated with climate change;

— provide standards developers with a systematic approach to address climate change impacts, risks and opportunities in a coherent and consistent manner, with regard to both new and revised standards, and in a manner related to the objective and scope of the standard being developed;

— promote consistency and compatibility to the extent practical among standards that directly or indirectly address climate change and their wider uptake in support of sustainability.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that all ISO standards absolutely must include a clause aimed at addressing climate change, but it does mean that the writers of these standards should think seriously about it. Furthermore, as you have just read, this guidance was intended to apply not only to standards yet to be written but also those that already existed.

I decided to put this to the test by looking up an old friend of mine: ISO 9001. In my day, this was just about quality management and had nothing to do with climate change. But this is what a 2024 amendment had to say:

Clause 4.1

Add the following sentence at the end of the subclause:

The organization shall determine whether climate change is a relevant issue.

Clause 4.2

Add the following note at the end of the subclause:

NOTE Relevant interested parties can have requirements related to climate change.

So not only has ISO 9001 now responded to Guide 84’s insistence that it should take up the cause for climate action, it has done so by passing on that imperative to certificate holders.

ISO 9001 certification is pretty ubiquitous, so there can’t be that many organisations missing out on the fun. But ISO 9001 is also quite generic, and it is indeed true that relevant interested parties can have quality requirements related to climate change. But what about other ISO standards? For example, cyber security is rather a niche subject. Surely, ISO 27001 – the standard for Information Security Management Systems – can’t possibly have a requirement covering climate change, can it?

Wrong! Once again, ISO 27001 has its own 2024 amendment requiring the addition of exactly the same clauses. And what about health and safety? The relevant standard is ISO 45001 – and guess what. I could go on.

So, ISO Guide 84:2020 really does seem to be achieving the desired result. I’m sure that Nigel is a really good bloke and a true professional. It’s just that he was also the bureaucrat’s bureaucrat; which, unfortunately, means that when he caught the climate change bug, he became a superspreader.

I’m reminded how the UK’s Education and Training Foundation (ETF) ‘refreshed’ the overarching professional standards for the further education sector, requiring educators to model sustainable practices and promote sustainable development principles relevant to their subject specialism. And believe me, they do expect every subject specialism to be the perfect opportunity to promote sustainable development principles. Maths, Dentistry, History, Media Studies – pick any subject and you have ready access to resources that enable you to convert your specialism into the perfect platform for pushing the climate action agenda.

So, it seems to me that the urge to worry about the effects of climate change is now well and truly institutionalised, such that there can no longer be an area of specialism that can’t be co-opted for that purpose. It starts within the education system but continues into the workplace. And just to keep everyone on the same page, there are always standards and guidelines available to ensure that your concerns abide by the authorized narrative.

I’m just so glad I’m now far too old to have to deal with any of this first hand. I’m happily retired, and there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t wake up to the exquisite pleasure of knowing I don’t have to go to work and that my day can be filled instead with nothing more than idle curiosity and the search for other influential Nigels.

22 Comments

  1. It’s Communist psychology, Red in tooth and claw. What is happening here is that the system, the state, the establishment is installing the cult of climate change into every aspect of corporate life, forcing everyone to uncritically acknowledge the existence of so called ‘climate change’ (man-made of course), to not ignore it, or worse still, to refrain from critically questioning it and/or its relevance to, in this case, the creation of formal standards. The establishment requires only that you pay due, unthinking obeisance to the God of Climate Change in everything you do. There shall be no separation of the State from Climate Change. Climate Change is to be embedded in every aspect of our lives, even down to the minutiae of seemingly unrelated mundane quality control standards.

    Liked by 3 people

  2. Thank you John – Cliscep at its best.

    My generally intelligent and well-educated friends don’t seem to understand my obsession with the climate change and net zero narratives and the damage they are causing. They have no idea how deeply entrenched this all is within the stablishment and how it increasingly (often adversely) affects every aspect of life. So it’s a fair bet that the vast majority of the population (who can be persuaded to back net zero by vaguely-worded opinion poll questions) haven’t a clue either.

    In the event that the next UK general election delivers, say, a Reform government, a Tory government, or a Reform/Tory coalition, that is committed to ridding the country of this blight, they will have their hands full. The establishment will thwart them at every turn. There are trip-wires and time bombs everywhere.

    Meanwhile, they wonder why UK productivity is so low. LIke you, I am so pleased I am retired. As (latterly in my career) company secretary and in-house lawyer to a medium-sized company that couldn’t afford to employ a dedicated risk manager, the stuff your article alludes to used to be dealt with by me. I’m delighted that’s someone else’s problem now – but it would be far better if the problem was removed.

    Liked by 2 people

  3. “My generally intelligent and well-educated friends don’t seem to understand my obsession with the climate change and net zero narratives and the damage they are causing.”

    That’s just it though, isn’t it Mark. If they are generally intelligent and well-educated, why are they not on here, at least trying to understand what makes you (and us) tick? If they are genuinely intelligent, why are they not attempting to cogently and coherently argue against your viewpoint and make the rational case for their own?

    I submit, they are brainwashed, unthinking followers of fashion who, because they are educated and still possess a modicum of rational intelligence, will not dare to alight on these pages because they know their tank is empty and the redundancy of their intellectual world view would become achingly apparent, not least to themselves, thus imperilling their comfortably numb existence. I would love to be proved wrong. Regrettably, that will not happen.

    Liked by 1 person

  5. To pursue your delightful light touch on a regrettably important topic, did you come across Nigel Pargetter? He fell to his death from the roof of his family mansion while taking insufficient precautionary action. The event certainly had a big impact on The Archers and maybe found its way into H&S guidelines for solar panel fitters.

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  6. Jaime,

    My friends aren’t climate alarmists or net zero fanatics either. I imagine that, despite their intelligence, they simply have a naive assumption that the people in charge can be trusted to take advice from experts and to do the right thing.

    You might argue that in that case they aren’t so intelligent after all. I would suggest that instead they just have busy lives, and perhaps make lazy – rather than unintelligent – assumptions. I suspect also that they spend too much time watching – and trusting – the BBC.

    Liked by 2 people

  7. They’re your friends of course Mark, and so you have some sympathy for them, understandably. Alas, I have none. There are too many people in this country; intelligent, comfortable, largely middle class, reasonably affluent, well educated, etc. who cannot be bothered, for whatever reason, to question the rationale behind a pervasive policy which will hugely and negatively affect their lives, and the lives of their children and grandchildren in the near future. Even when they have a friend like yourself who can point the way towards constructive criticism and well informed scepticism. It is laziness, and it is also the abdication of a moral duty to family, friends and society in general to question authority, especially when the consequences of not doing so are so momentous. That may sound harsh, but that’s the way I see it. That’s the way I saw it with Covid too.

    Liked by 1 person

  8. Jaime,

    I don’t necessarily disagree, but it’s human nature, I’m afraid.

    Like

  9. Jaimie,

    I agree that once the media, the education system, the legal system, and the world of regulations have been brought under control, there is very little chance of there being any effective push back. As you put it, “There shall be no separation of the State from Climate Change”. The authorised apparatus of thought only allows one train of thinking. Anyone who does not appear to be on that train is engaging in an aberration, a non-compliance demanding corrective action.

    You also ask:

    “If they [Mark’s friends] are generally intelligent and well-educated, why are they not on here, at least trying to understand what makes you (and us) tick? If they are genuinely intelligent, why are they not attempting to cogently and coherently argue against your viewpoint and make the rational case for their own?”

    I believe they would claim already to have made the rational case, and the fact that we are rejecting it can be taken as the hallmark of our irrationality. From that point onwards we become an interesting subject for study, in which the various bases for irrationality can be conjectured and explored. Such a study does not require engaging with the subject; indeed, objectivity demands that you don’t. Our reasoned objections are to them just phenomena to be weaved into a theory of pathology.

    Liked by 1 person

  10. Mark,

    “The establishment will thwart them at every turn. There are trip-wires and time bombs everywhere.”

    Exactly. The bed has been made and all there is left to do is to lie in it — even if it is a bed of nails.

    Liked by 1 person

  11. Max,

    I’m not sure that fictitious Nigels count.

    I’m sorry, but once a pedant, always a pedant 🙂

    Like

  12. Garry,

    As a fellow ex quality manager, I know that you have stared into the abyss of infinite futility. Retiring with your sanity is something to be proud of.

    Liked by 1 person

  13. It may not be of interest to many, but I have found the following explanation of the implications of the climate change amendments to the information security management system (ISMS) standard ISO 27001:

    https://www.thecoresolution.com/iso-27001-climate-change-amendment

    The most relevant observation, as far as I can see, is that everywhere that the guidance refers to ‘climate-related risk’ one could, and indeed should, substitute ‘weather-related risk’. For example, extreme weather events are treated as climate change risks, as though extreme weather was never a thing before AGW came along. As such, I cannot imagine an ISO 27001 compliant ISMS that would require any updating in order to become compliant with the proposed 2024 amendments.

    For example, the ISO 27001 compliant ISMS that I created back in the day, well before 2024, already covered the implications of flood risk to my organisation. Thinking about climate change as a possible factor in that risk would not alter anything. The risk management arrangements were already built into my system because I never had to wait for the climate change circus to come to town before thinking about extreme weather events. The same goes for all other so-called climate change risks.

    The whole thing looks like a load of baloney to me. I’ll say it again, I’m so relieved that I am no longer having to deal with this sort of crap anymore.

    Liked by 1 person

  14. John,

    That link is fascinating and depressing in equal measure. I noticed this:

    Clause 4.1 is about understanding the organization and its context. The climate change addition to this clause is, “The organization shall determine whether climate change is a relevant issue.”

    Am I being very naughty if I suggest that an organisation could simply and cheerfully declare that climate change isn’t a relevant issue for it?

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  15. Mark,

    They could, but what do you think are the chances of an auditor letting them get away with it?

    Like

  16. The obvious point from John’s article is that it shows in distilled form the pernicious way in which climate change (and its close bedfellow, net zero) is now completely embedded in UK society, to the point where it is virtually a state religion. Certainly, the state broadcaster (the BBC) never passes up an opportunity to shoehorn climate change in to programmes that might, in a sane society, seems to be completely unrelated to it. Regularly, when I tune in to BBC Radio 4, it takes seconds only before I hear the words “climate change”. It is a rare day indeed when I tune in and haven’t heard those words after listening for half an hour or so.

    So, climate change is deeply embedded in government (national, devolved and local) and among the civil service; at the BBC and most of the mainstream media; in church; at universities and in schools and nurseries; at the Bank of England and most financial institutions; in the Courts; and now we find that, via ISO standards, it is embedded in business too.

    Its effect is pernicious. It adds to costs and it reduces productivity. It distracts from more immediate issues. It is a get out of jail free card. Did your street flood because the Council failed to clear your drains? Don’t be silly – it’s because of climate change. Was your car damaged when driving through a large potholes because the council fails to maintain the roads properly? No it wasn’t – it’s because of climate change. And so on.

    It is overwhelming us. It has to stop.

    Liked by 2 people

  17. Mark,

    Once the obsession with climate change has become a requirement, to be ignored at your peril, there remains little hope that the likes of us can make any difference.

    Liked by 1 person

  18. John,

    All we can do is keep pointing out the stupidity of the current direction of travel. As the pain intensifies, people will join the dots. I like to think we make it a little easier for them to see the pattern.

    And it’s important to keep challenging the narrative – we must push back against the lies and distortions.

    We may not be able to make much, if any difference, but at least my conscience is clear – I know we’re trying, rather than not bothering.

    Liked by 2 people

  19. Well said Mark.

    I well remember climategate & thinking this will cause “the dam to burst” over the climate hype.

    Stupid me, nobody noticed or cared apart from a few.

    Liked by 2 people

  21. Mark, regarding pointing out the stupidity, here is the latest from William Happer The text is an excerpt from Canary in a Climate World: Climate Realism vs. the Net Zero Myth, a newly released book bringing together 38 Climate Canaries from across science, climatology, geology, engineering, economics, medicine, law, journalism, public policy and independent research. The chapter, by Princeton physicist Professor William Happer, is one of many thought-provoking contributions examining climate science, energy policy, Net Zero and the wider climate debate.

    “Fifty years from now, academic treatises will be written about the climate madness that prevailed when these canary songs were written. I hope the songs will clarify the Zeitgeist of this bizarre interval in the history of human folly.”

    “Climate nonsense will eventually end and will be dumped onto the ash heap of history where it belongs. But the longer the cult goes on, the more damage is done. We should all do what we can to stop the madness as soon as possible.”

    My synopsis:

    https://rclutz.com/2026/06/13/disband-the-climate-cult-madness-happer/

    Liked by 2 people

  22. And some good news about uprooting entrenched climatist prescriptions in governing institutions:

    https://www.sec.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2026-49-sec-proposes-rescission-climate-related-disclosure-rules

    “Washington D.C., May 29, 2026 —

    The Securities and Exchange Commission today proposed the rescission of overly burdensome and costly rules that require companies to provide certain climate-related information in their registration statements and annual reports. The Commission’s proposal focuses on returning the agency to its core mandate – in line with its legal authority – and restoring a materiality-focused approach to securities regulation.”

    “The Commission is now proposing to rescind the climate disclosure rules in their entirety because they exceed the scope of the agency’s statutory authority. Even if it had authority to adopt such final rules, the Commission believes there are independent, compelling policy reasons to rescind them entirely:

    ♦ They are at odds with the Commission’s policy objectives of facilitating capital formation and promoting public company status.

    ♦ They are unnecessary and inconsistent with a registrant-specific, materiality-based approach to disclosure that best serves the interests of registrants and investors.

    ♦ They stray well beyond the policy concerns of the federal securities laws.

    ♦ They impose substantial costs on public companies and their shareholders that are not justified by the informational benefits they may provide to some investors.

    Liked by 2 people

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