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Harper hating on the environment
November 16, 2011
By
Amber Garratt
Prime Minister Stephen Harper is putting the economy before the environment again. There have been rumours flying around for several weeks now that Harper plans to cut more than 200 million dollars in funding for research and monitoring of the environment, yet he plans to spend more than 60 billion dollars on new military jets and warships.
These rumours began after an article was published in Nature, a British scientific journal, which discussed the proposed cuts to Canadian environmental research and monitoring, with a particular focus on cutting ozone monitoring. Canada’s ozone monitoring network was instrumental in discovering the first ozone hole over Canada last spring and is internationally renowned.
Throughout Harper’s tenure as prime minister, he has made it blatantly evident that he does not care about Canada’s environment and has made it difficult for the media to publicize environmental issues. In 2007, Harper introduced a new rule to control journalists interviews with Environment Canada scientists. According to an internal analysis report released in 2010, this new rule resulted in an 80 per cent drop in media coverage of climate change science. Canadians pay taxes to support government programs and services, and cutting millions of dollars from environmental research and monitoring is harmful to the environment and to Canadian citizens.
Environment Canada measurements indicate that the ozone hole over the Arctic resulted in lower ozone over most Canadians this summer, and UV levels were about three to five per cent higher than previous years. These results alone speak to the importance of researching and monitoring Canada’s ozone hole.
Thomas Duck, an atmospheric scientist at Dalhousie University, spoke out about Harper’s proposed cutbacks stating, “T he proposed cuts go so far the network won’t be able to do serious science.”
Harper appears to be digging himself deeper into an environmental hole as he cuts important environmental programs and approves an environmentally damaging pipeline. His decisions might not have immediate effects, but they will be detrimental for generations to come. Cutting ozone research and monitoring runs the risk of allowing the ozone hole to continue to develop and put the health of Canadian citizens in jeopardy.
Environment Canada has been speaking out since the rumours of the potential cutbacks saying “Nothing has been cut. We are optimizing and streamlining the way we monitor and measure ozone.”
What does optimizing and streamlining really mean? To me it sounds like more bullshit coming out of Harper’s mouth so that the media doesn’t have a field day with his decision to cut funding.
Harper and his conservative government are putting Canada at risk of environmental destruction, but is doing so in a way that leaves the Canadian citizens in the dark.
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Amber is the Managing Editor of the Gazette. She has been with the paper since she was a volunteer in Volume 102. She became an Arts & Entertainment Editor for first semester of Volume 103 and an Arts & Life Editor for Volume 104. She graduated Western with a B.A. in Geography.
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