Last month I went to Lord Frost’s superb lecture for the Global Warming Policy Foundation about the harm net zero will do to the British economy. He pointed out that the government is completely unrealistic about the economic cost of the policy, which former energy minister Chris Skidmore claimed last year could boost GDP by up to 2 per cent, thanks in part to cheaper household energy bills. (As Frost said: ‘Good luck with that.’) This is even more Pollyannaish than Labour’s energy review in 2003, which at least acknowledged that achieving a 60 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050 would cost 2 per cent of GDP. When ministers are pressed on how the economy will cope with problems such as the intermittency of wind and solar power and the mind-boggling expense of creating adequate battery storage, they are reduced to muttering that ‘something will turn up’.

The fact that our political masters have embarked on such a ruinous course would have seen them turfed out of office in decades gone by, Frost said. But the problem today is that the intellectual climate is highly collectivist. Vast swaths of the electorate believe the purpose of policy-making is to tame markets, not liberate them, and are convinced that the 2008 crash was caused by the free enterprise system rather than bad regulation and poor central bank decision–making. In the mainstream media, anyone expressing scepticism about the impact of anthropogenic global warming is viewed with intense suspicion.

During the Q&A that followed the lecture, I asked Lord Frost if we should take a leaf out of our opponents’ book and set up a militant anti-green-activist group. The eco-protestors say their reason for disrupting major sporting events and holding up traffic is to stop people ignoring the ‘climate emergency’, a rationale I’ve always found baffling, since the professional-managerial class talk about nothing else and the public is bombarded with environmentalist propaganda 24/7.

But net-zero sceptics like me genuinely are a beleaguered minority, unable to get a hearing in the public square. In fact, we are exactly who the eco-protestors imagine themselves to be – concerned citizens desperately trying to draw attention to an impending disaster, but dismissed as ‘alarmists’ by policy-makers. So while the antisocial behaviour of Extinction Rebellion and Insulate Britain makes little sense – they’re like pro-communist protestors in Soviet Russia – similar antics by climate contrarians could make an impact. If I unfurl a giant banner outside the Green party’s Brighton headquarters saying ‘Just Stop Snake Oil’, people might sit up and take notice. At the very least, it would draw attention to the fact that there is another side to this debate.

Not surprisingly, Lord Frost wasn’t convinced. It was bad enough having to contend with the eco-loons wreaking havoc on our roads and bridges, he said, without the provisional wing of the Global Warming Policy Foundation adding to the chaos. In any event, he didn’t think that trying to disrupt the Derby did the other side’s cause much good. Wouldn’t it be better to let them continue to lose friends and alienate people? By all means ridicule them, he said. But for God’s sake don’t imitate them.

I’m not so sure. Judging from the reluctance of juries to convict eco-protestors, the public seems pretty sympathetic. Yes, commuters may be unimpressed by someone lying in the road when they’re late for work, but many admire the activists’ courage and commitment. According to an Omnisis poll published last year, two-thirds of people support taking non-violent direct action to protect Britain’s environment and 75 per cent are in favour of installing solar panels on farmland. More recently, Ipsos found that 84 per cent of Britons are concerned about climate change and more than half think we should aim to achieve net zero sooner than 2050. It looks to me as if the tactics of the pink-haired militants are succeeding.

So who’s with me? We could start by daubing red paint on the Belgravia homes of the billionaire backers of these ‘anti-capitalists’ protestors. Then rush the stage at Coldplay’s next concert – their tour is called ‘Sustainability: Music of the Spheres’ – and rip open some packets of green powder. And to conclude our first campaign, next time there’s some international green boondoggle in London I will lead a group of sceptics on to the main runway at Farnborough so we can lie down and prevent all the leading advocates of net zero landing in their private jets. ‘How dare you?’ Greta Thunberg will ask. To which I’ll reply: ‘Who dares wins.’