Mr. Speaker, I asked a question about the cuts to research funding, and I did not receive an answer to my question. I was speaking about Katrin Meissner, an accomplished B.C. climate scientist, who is packing up and moving from Canada to Australia because of the cuts to science funding.
There was $365 million cut from science and technology when one adjusts for inflation. That is a substantial withdrawal of support for this very critical activity. Two thousand top researchers recently signed a petition calling for urgent federal action to stop the brain drain. Why, in 2009, do we have a government whose policies are driving our key researchers out of Canada? In fact a minister from the other side called it absurd that there would be continuing funding by government for science and research. This is very difficult for people to understand in my community, where I have the University of British Columbia and research is a key part of the economy and the well-being of people in the future.
The person who is moving is a climate scientist. It is particularly concerning that the government is eliminating its capability to do what needs to be done to reduce greenhouse gases. It does bring into question whether the government has any intention to reduce greenhouse gases or do anything to take action on climate change.
I would suggest that the record to date would lead to the answer of no. It has absolutely no intention or commitment to this issue. Three years, three ministers and three plans, with zero results. I will point out that the government is led by a prime minister who made this statement only a handful of years ago. He said:
We will oppose ratification of the Kyoto Protocol and its targets. We will work with the provinces and others to discourage the implementation of those targets. And we will rescind the targets when we have the opportunity to do so.
That is pretty clear. The government has no intention of reducing greenhouse gases. In contrast, when the Liberal Party was in government they were leaders on that issue. The Liberals ratified and negotiated Kyoto, and they went to work to bring industry and the public on board. We saw emissions drop between 2004 and 2006 under the former Liberal government. There has been a pathetic recidivism on this issue since the Conservative government took charge.
Surprisingly enough, the Conservative government did agree to a target. Let us look at how it is actually doing. We will turn to the report from the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development, in which it is clear that the Conservatives are a complete disaster on climate change. There is no honesty, no action, no tracking and no credibility. The commissioner said that the plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are missing information required by law, that the plans overstate expected emissions, and that the plans are not transparent and there is no system to monitor and report results.
The commissioner himself asked if the environment department could explain why it could supposedly estimate emission reductions in advance but could not actually measure these reductions after the fact.