by PATRICK LEJTENYI

On Thursday, April 13, Natural Resources Canada, the federal agency more than a little involved in implementing the country’s strategy to bring it in line with the Kyoto Protocol, quietly announced that it was axing 15 programs aimed at reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. If it was hoped that the news would be more or less ignored, coming as it did the day before a long weekend, those hopes were dashed when, on the same day, the Globe and Mail reported that the feds are going to slash spending on Environment Canada programs by 80 per cent, while cutting other ministries’ climate change budgets by 40 per cent. The report was based on Cabinet documents that made its way to the opposition Liberals.

Also on Thursday, news broke that Mark Tushingham, an Environment Canada scientist who recently published a novel called Hotter Than Hell, about a Canada-U.S. war over water resources set in the near and globally-warmed future, would not be allowed to speak at a launch at Ottawa’s National Press Club. Rona Ambrose, the new 36-year-old Environment Minister from Edmonton, said Tushingham was barred from speaking because he was considered to be representing Environment Canada, although all the publicity material described him as an Ottawa scientist. Tushingham is reportedly fearing for his job.

Greens hitting back

Environmentalists, naturally, are fuming. Again last Wednesday (what a busy week it was!), representatives from eight Canadian environmental groups held a press conference in Ottawa urging the opposition parties to bring down the federal government if it abandons Canada’s Kyoto commitments, which requires a six per cent reduction of greenhouse gas emissions from 1990 levels by 2012. Emissions have risen by 30 per cent.

“Definitely, we subscribe to that,” says Sidney Ribaux, co-founder and coordinator of Montreal-based Equiterre, when asked of his position regarding toppling the government. “We talk to all the opposition parties, and we talk to the government, about how crucial this issue is. If the government can’t say how much of a priority Kyoto is to Canadians, it’s up to the opposition parties to raise the issue.”

He says 89 per cent of Quebecers favour “strong action” regarding climate change, and believes that the Conservatives are finally waking up to the fact that Canadians support decisive action regarding global warming. What annoys him most, however, is the government making deep cuts without having anything else planned.

“It’s like a government taking power and saying they have a new policy on education, and then closing all the schools while they’re developing it,” he says.

The approach the Conservatives are taking to climate change—newspeak for global warming—is a “made-in-Canada” one, whatever that means. And at present, it means exactly nothing, because no new measures have been introduced. The new budget, expected in the next few weeks, should contain some global warming-fighting measures, but how effective they may be remains to be seen.

One-Tonne demise

Among the casualties from the Conservative bloodletting is perhaps the country’s highest-profile educational measure, the One-Tonne Challenge, with its smug spokesman, Newfie comic Rick Mercer. It had its funding cut off late last month, something Ribaux considers unfortunate.

“What I often compare it to is what we’ve done with smoking in the last 30 years,” says Ribaux. “Through educational campaigns, and later legislation, we’ve been able to completely turn [conventional thinking] around.” Lessons learned by the One-Tonne Challenge, which urged consumers to cut their individual greenhouse gas output by 20 per cent through simple measures like turning off lights and lowering the thermostat, increase in value over generations, he says. “In the long term, it could have created support for measures that will be drastically needed in the coming years,” he says.

Other Natural Resources initiatives falling under the “Different Approaches Required” heading include the Market Incentive Program, which would encourage electricity marketers to offer consumers the option of purchasing “green” power, and the Studies in Monitoring for Greenhouse Gas Reduction Program, designed to increase knowledge of emissions-reducing opportunities, according to Natural Resources Canada’s Web site (for a full list of cuts, see www.nrcan-rncan.gc.ca—it’s on the home page).

The one thing the feds plan to do is to make transit passes tax deductible, a plan mulled by the preceding Liberal government. Ribaux likes the idea, but doesn’t think it’s enough on its own. The Globe and Mail cites studies from Environment Canada and the U.S. Department of Labor that transit use would increase two to four per cent, constituting a negligible effect on greenhouse gas emissions.