The recording, made by Greenpeace, appeared to show the MP's support for Delingpole's independent, anti-windfarm candidacy, at a time when Heaton-Harris was engaged by the Conservatives to run the unsuccessful campaign of their own candidate, Christine Emmett. Heaton-Harris indicated that this was linked to a plan by core members of the Conservative Party to emasculate the Climate Change Act by making its commitments advisory rather than mandatory. After Heaton-Harris apologised for the impression he gave in the video, Home Secretary Theresa May said he was guilty only of silly bragging, while Labour's Michael Dugher MP urged Prime Minister David Cameron to show leadership and punish him. The Corby by-election was subsequently lost by the Conservatives with a swing to Labour of 12.8 per cent. Letters to universities In October 2017, the Eurosceptic Heaton-Harris wrote to the vice-chancellors of every university in the UK, requesting the names of academics lecturing on Brexit and copies of all course material, leading to claims of political interference in academic freedom, as well as censorship. The move was described as "McCarthyite" by Professor Kevin Featherstone, head of the European Institute at the London School of Economics, and "sinister" by Professor David Green, the vice-Chancellor of Worcester University who likened it to Newspeak and the Thought Police from George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four: the Dean of Durham Law School, Thom Brooks, called it "dog whistle politics at its worst", while Lord Patten, Chancellor of Oxford University, called the letter an act of "idiotic and offensive Leninism". In addition, the letter attracted criticism from both pro-Remain and pro-Leave academics at Cambridge and London's Queen Mary universities, and a rebuke from Downing Street. Responding the next day to the widespread criticism from both politicians and academics, universities minister Jo Johnson suggested that Heaton-Harris might have been researching a possible book on "the evolution of attitudes" to Europe, rather than acting in his role as a government minister, and "probably didn't appreciate the degree to which (the letter) would be misinterpreted", although there was no mention of any research for a possible book in the original letter. On 17 February 2019, Heaton-Harris said that there had never been any plans for a book. European Research Group Heaton-Harris chaired the European Research Group (ERG), a group of Eurosceptic MPs, from 2010 until November 2016. Subscriptions totalling £13,850 were claimed as a parliamentary expense. At the same time he sat on the