It is time to "move on" past the controversy surrounding the so-called "Climategate" emails taken last year from a server at the University of East Anglia, the British government said last week.

Climate skeptics have alleged that the thousands of emails taken from UEA's Climatic Research Unit (CRU) show scientists manipulated and withheld data and stifled dissenting views, although several subsequent reviews in Britain and the United States have not found evidence to support those allegations.

Now the British government has espoused the same view in its official response to a House of Commons committee's recent report on two U.K. reviews of the CRU emails.

"After two independent reviews, and two reviews by the Science and Technology Committee, we find no evidence to question the scientific basis of human influence on climate," concludes the response prepared by the U.K. Government Office of Science, dated May 6.

Later in the document, the government says "no events at CRU undermine the scientific consensus on human-induced climate change."

However, the U.K. government said it accepted criticism made by one review, led by former civil servant Sir Muir Russell, of the university's compliance with Britain's Freedom of Information (FOI) Act.

"The Government will continue to work with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) to determine the extent that alleged offences, under section 77 of the FOI Act and Regulation 19 of the EIR [Environmental Information Regulations], have not been prosecuted as a result of the current provisions," the government response reads.

The government is also working to develop new FOI guidance for scientists with the help of country's institutions of higher education, the government's chief science adviser and the U.K. Royal Society. Those guidelines are expected by September.