Heard of the Carteret Islands?

British television has its highs and lows. Last night a deadly serious topic was given such a thick coating of sugared-cliche that I began questioning whether the report was a fabrication. ITV was reporting live from ...... the Carteret Islands, 'deep in the Pacific Ocean' (cue short flash of imprecise map). I'm ashamed to say I'd never heard of them - and our excitable reporter chose not to mention that they form part of Papua New Guinea (an inconvenient fact it turns out). The highest point in the island group is 170cm above sea level - not a huge margin for error to begin with.

The islands hold the dubious honour of being among the first rendered less-habitable by tidal surges. The looming issue of forced removals due to rising sea levels is an important one, both humanitarian, and in what it implies for our collective future. I have no reason to question that the increased incidence and severity of tidal surges is linked to climate change. But it is impossible to engage seasoned sceptics on these issues by playing loose with the facts.

Here are a few of the skin-deep grabs in the ITV report:

'These people have nowhere to go' - Actually as citizens of PNG they have an entire country to relocate to. And it turns out that a number of island residents shifted there relatively recently escaping the Bouganville conflict. Bouganville (now peaceful), mainland, neither salubrious, but neither underwater either.

'When the tides recede mosquito's breed in the pools of water' - according to the WHO, mosquitoes larvae do not breed in sea water, and where brackish, rely on the addition of another source of water - ie: receding sea water would not by itself encourage malaria growth (http://www.who.int/malaria/docs/tsunamiTN2005.pdf). Semantics perhaps, but loose with the causalities.

'What have these people done to deserve to lose their home' - there are some suggestions that bomb fishing on the reef has accentuated the increase in tidal surges (UNDP). Also the islands lie in a geologically unstable region, and geological shifts may be reducing the islands elevation. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carteret_Islands)

I don't doubt that these poor people are enduring great suffering and uncertainty as they face drastic changes to their living environment, and perhaps evacuation. Nor do I question that climate change caused by industrial emissions is partly to blame. But presenting these issues in kindergarten simplicity begs questions where there should be none. To not mention that the Carteret Islands form part of the Papua New Guinean state, no doubt a deliberate journalistic ploy to embellish the impression of insecurity, would seem a cynical play on the limited geographical awareness of us couch potatoes. I've been poring over maps and spinning globes since I was a little kid, and I'd never heard mention of these islands.

Anyway..... poor them. Where countries are faced with such scenarios across their entire landmass (Tuvalu) I reckon we should be doing the neighbourly thing and making room on our lounge room floors. Until then, my frustration with journalists (and anyone else for that matter) playing loose with the facts on climate change will not diminish. There are some evil cigar-puffing industrialists out there who chuckle heartily every time someone blames a rainy day in summer on climate change. Simplicity, and the omission of 'inconvenient truths' spells the death of a cogent argument.