The Harper government was warned last year by its environmental scientific experts that Canada would have to join an aggressive international campaign to fight global warming to avoid "substantial global and Canadian impacts" or risk irreversible damage to the planet, newly-released memorandums obtained by Canwest News Service reveal.
The warning was contained in memorandums sent in June 2007 by Brian Gray, head of Environment Canada's science and technology branch, to the department's deputy minister. The documents were delivered days before Prime Minister Stephen Harper attended a summit of industrialized countries, hosted by Germany which was seeking consensus among countries for an international agreement to contain global warming to two degrees Celcius above pre-industrial levels.
Mr. Harper recognized the threat of climate change at the meeting, but his government has never taken a stance on Mr. Gray's warnings that allowing average temperatures to rise over a sustained period by two degrees could drastically affect the world.
Delivered in June 2007, which is amazing, when you hear this lame excuse from Baird's office:
Eric Richer, a spokesman for Environment Minister John Baird, said he was not able to comment on whether the government agreed with all the conclusions listed in the memorandums without examining them in detail.
Nine months later, and nobody has read the conclusions "in detail". Nobody in Baird's office bothered to read a report by it's own scientific experts? That is just a staggering excuse, we can't comment, because we're not sure what they said.
Such is life when you are trying to pull the wool over everyone's eyes. In fairness, incompetence does seem reasonable.
3 comments:
What strikes me even more is the gap between the Cons' talking point and the issue they're actually dealing with:
"Our position internationally has been clear -- while Canada is doing its part at home, we still need action on the world stage from countries like China, India, and the U.S., rowing together in the same direction," said Mr. Richer.
"Otherwise we won't reduce greenhouse gases at all."
That's a weak argument at best even if the question is whether or not to bash Kyoto or other international agreements rather than cooperating with the international community. But surely if the Cons' goal was actually to get the holdouts on board, the first step would be to secure agreement on a global goal such as the 2-degree target.
and to make it worse the polls show the public can't decide between active incompetence and inactive incompetence, what a bloody mess.
"But surely if the Cons' goal was actually to get the holdouts on board, the first step would be to secure agreement on a global goal such as the 2-degree target."
The only constant, the contradictions with the rhetoric.
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