How can you expect the public to be well informed and base their electoral choices on fact if you’re not giving them the facts to work with in the first place? The public are the effective shareholders of a government, you wouldn’t want a business to be hiding information from shareholders that could impact operations, what makes this so significantly different?
I don’t believe research scientists should be sharing information about their projects directly with the media or the public.
I doubt you’ll find that the media would be able to interview a research scientist from Intel, or Microsoft, or Google and expect that scientist simple hand over information on the projects he’s working on. It doesn’t happen, and if it did he would be fired. I don’t see why the government asking its employees to abide by the same rules is an issue.
I’m not sure you quite understand how science works.
Researchers share their data with the scientific community. It’s a group effort on behalf of humanity. Canada funds scientists because Canada and Canadians benefit from science. Scientists who work for private companies are restricted, but those restrictions mean that their science is less useful to the global scientific community: it is occasionally biased (see the research sponsored by the tobacco industry in decades past), and it is not shared freely, so other people can’t build on their work.
So if you’d like to slow science down, by all means ensure that scientists can’t freely communicate with each other.
Ironically, if Canada were to be *more *generous with its support, scientists would be less inclined to go sharing with the media and the public. As it stands, getting air time and thus public attention is a way of securing access to scarce funds.
I assumed we’re still sharing information with the scientific community. I haven’t seen anything that states otherwise. I thought the issue was sharing information directly with the media and public without the involvement, knowledge and acceptance of the respective minister.
I could be wrong.
If you’re sharing information with the scientific community, that means it has been made public. I don’t quite understand your objection: you don’t mind scientists publicizing their information to specialists, but you do object to their educating the general public about the information they have already made public?
Sigh… It was my understanding that this so-called “muzzling” dealt with research scientists themselves being asked not to speak to the media or public directly. Scientific research is obviously still being performed, but results are shared through the applicable spokesperson or ministry, not by the actual scientists.
If Intel wants to do a press release on their new chip geometry the information is coming from the public relations department, not through some back-room scientist who is running to CNN to spill the company’s trade secrets.
I don’t see any difference if the government is your employer. No one, absolutely no one, at my place of work can talk to the media about anything, and we do a tonne of research on behalf of the government and private industry.
And that hilarious comment obviously makes any further attempt at conversation completely futile.
But for those of us capable of comprehending the difference between government and private industry, the facts are quite chilling. Harper has created a very serious problem that has been the subject of widespread concern for years, not just in Canada, but internationally.
Macleans is a pretty conservative Canadian magazine. They had this to say:
With the muzzling of scientists, Harper’s obsession with controlling the message verges on the Orwellian
From an association of Canadian scientists:
It’s no secret the Harper government has a problem with science. In fact, Canada’s scientists are so frustrated with this government’s recent overhaul of scientific communications policies and cuts to research programs they took to the streets, marching on Parliament Hill last summer to decry the “Death of Evidence.” Their concerns— expressed on their protest banners—followed a precise logic: “no science, no evidence, no truth, no democracy.”
From an Environics survey of federal government research scientists:
Hundreds of federal scientists said in a survey that they had been asked to exclude or alter technical information in government documents for non-scientific reasons, and thousands said they had been prevented from responding to the media or the public.
From the Globe and Mail, one of Canada’s leading newspapers:
Globe editorial: Ottawa’s silencing of scientists should end
Internationally, from the New York Times:
Over the last few years, the government of Canada — led by Stephen Harper — has made it harder and harder for publicly financed scientists to communicate with the public and with other scientists.
It began badly enough in 2008 when scientists working for Environment Canada, the federal agency, were told to refer all queries to departmental communications officers. Now the government is doing all it can to monitor and restrict the flow of scientific information, especially concerning research into climate change, fisheries and anything to do with the Alberta tar sands — source of the diluted bitumen that would flow through the controversial Keystone XL pipeline. Journalists find themselves unable to reach government scientists; the scientists themselves have organized public protests.
There was trouble of this kind here in the George W. Bush years, when scientists were asked to toe the party line on climate policy and endangered species. But nothing came close to what is being done in Canada.
From the BBC: Canadian government is ‘muzzling its scientists’
Perhaps their recent success in Alberta makes them look like a more serious option elsewhere.
The difference is that government does not have “trade secrets.”
None of these opinion pieces convinces me that the Conservatives are wrong in wanting to control the opinion of scientists who are under their employ. Sorry. I don’t see the distinction from public companies, and by the way (for now) I work for a crown corporation and the rules are simple: you can’t talk to the media without prior clearance on what the message will be.
It sounds entirely reasonable to me.
The world would be a better place if scientists “controlled” the opinions of Conservatives.
Scientists push their own political agenda.
Yes. Fighting ignorance. Rings a bell.
Of? More publicly funded research ultimately serving the interests of all Canadians? Those bastards! Thank God we have full time political hacks shielding us from such influence. background sound of dump trucks of poliPAC money flooding our popular media
Who really needs accurate census data, a national science adviser, or unmuzzled federal (climate/environment/marine/etc) scientists? Quite frankly, Conservative media protocol geared solely towards suppressing debate on important issues of public interest trumps the long term welfare of Canadians, right?
The race is not official yet, but we might need a maple elections thread.
Scientists want the right to publish their findings when research funded by the government disagrees with their agenda. Currently they simply suppress it. That’s just appalling, by any measure.
They changed every reference to, “The Canadian Government”, in every news release/publication they’ve ever done to, “The Harper Government”, I hate them for this alone.
If you don’t think this government is destroying Canada do a little reading about recent events in Shoal Lake. If that doesn’t disgust you, colour me stunned! (Sorry, tried three times to make a link!)
Apparently the sort of Tory like Leaffan seems to be thinks that Harper is like a private-sector buyout artist, and he bought the Canadian government (and got to put his name on it) instead of being elected as a minister of the Crown.
Weird.
But Harper did buy it and trademark it, of course! And The Harper Government™ (name, colours, design and insignias, including the Canadian flag, registered trademarks of Stephen Harper Enterprises, Inc., © 2006, all rights reserved) has been protecting the Canadian public from the “agenda” of scientists since 2006. Anything these scientists have to say must understandably first be cleared through the likes of evolution-denying creationist science ministers, climate-change-denying environment ministers, and of course the Chief Lunatic himself, the guy who owns the place.
Anyone who may not appreciate how truly bad this is should read some of the links in my previous posts. But let’s also understand that muzzling scientists and censoring scientific findings that run against the interests of wingnut policy is just a last resort; The Harper Government™ is also happily engaged in making sure that such science never happens in the first place, through cutbacks in research funding and some really and truly remarkable appointees to major government science funding agencies:
[ul]
[li]Harper appointed Mark Mullins to the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), which funds university research projects including those on climate change. Mullins is most notably a fierce critic of the science on climate change and of the IPCC. He is director of the Fraser Institute, a right-wing policy advocacy lobby group, and was a former adviser to the Canadian Alliance Party, a right-wing party that Harper used to head, and which arose out of the even more extremist far-right Reform Party.[/li][/ul]
[ul]
[li]Harper appointed Christopher Essex to NSERC as well. Essex wrote a book challenging the “myth of climate change.”[/li][/ul]
[ul]
[li]Harper appointed John Weissenberger to the Canada Foundation for Innovation, which funds large research projects. Quoting the above link, “Weissenberger is a close friend of Prime Minister Stephen Harper, a former chief of staff in the Harper government and a geologist who works for Husky Energy in Alberta [and] has written opinion pieces in the media and on his Internet blog expressing his ‘skepticism about global warming’.”[/li][/ul]
But if any actual science nevertheless manages to get through, then by all means we must follow the rules: “Any and all scientific findings of government scientists are the property of The Harper Government™ and are copyright © by Stephen Harper Enterprises, Inc., and may not be published, transmitted, or disclosed in any way in whole or in part without written permission from The Harper Government™. If it’s anything to do with climate change just send it directly to John Weissenberger, c/o Husky Energy, The Oil Sands, Alberta. He’ll look it over and get right back to you.” 
So turning this back to the OP, no, Justin Trudeau doesn’t scare me just because he’s young and relatively inexperienced. The Harper Government™ scares the hell out of me!
Nothing weird about it. Conservatives believe in privatization and getting government out of areas where it doesn’t belong. I’m all for privatization. The private sector (statistically) delivers services more effectively than the public sector.
Also, it removes pension obligations from the taxpayers and moves it to the private sector: who can argue with that?
Governments can’t afford to be all things to everyone and the more government sells off the less the burden on taxpayers. We need to move in this direction or we will end up like Greece as the population ages and the young need to fund us in our old age.
I’d like to see the post office privatized, the CBC cut loose, the government removed entirely from the sale of alcohol, and teachers’ unions and health care unions deemed essential services. That would be a good start.
Meh.
I recall enough media references to “the Trudeau government,” “the Mulroney government,” “the Chretien government,” and “the Martin government” over the years. And no media outlet is obligated to follow what the government of the day wants to call itself–see Charter s. 2(b), “freedom of … expression.”
Seems to me that your beef is more with the media for not exercising their Charter rights as regards freedom of expression than it is with a government who would simply like to be known in a certain way. If the Toronto Star calls today’s government, “the Harper Government,” then that is the Star’s choice, and the Star knows it, as do its lawyers. Canada is not a country where a government can dictate how it is referred to in the media.