Inquiry into false climate-change facts dropped

The federal Competition Bureau has discontinued an inquiry that started last June into groups accused of making false or misleading claims about climate science.

Mélanie Beauchesne, a senior communications adviser with the federal government, said the allegations against the Friends of Science Society, International Climate Science Coalition and Heartland Institute are no longer being investigated.

“After careful consideration of the facts in this case,” she said in an email, “and to ensure the effective allocation of limited resources, the commissioner of competition decided to discontinue this inquiry.”

The 24-page complaint, filed in December 2015 by Charles Hatt of the Ecojustice legal charity, alleged that anti-climate change statements contravened the Competition Act’s rules against false and misleading representations.

The complaint outlined numerous examples of billboards and other advertisements that denied man-made climate change appearing in a number of Canadian cities, including Edmonton and Calgary.

These included billboards from the Friends of Science Society featuring statements such as “Global Warming? Not for 18+ years!” and “The sun is the main driver of climate change. Not you. Not CO2.”

Hatt filed the complaint on behalf of six individuals, including Tzeporah Berman, who recently served on, and was dismissed from, the Alberta Oil Sands Advisory Group, and David Schindler of the University of Alberta.

In a news release Tuesday, Hatt said public conversation must be based on scientific evidence, not falsehoods and junk science.

“We are extremely disappointed that after more than a year, the Competition Bureau has dropped its investigation into climate denier groups who appear to purposely mislead and deceive the public about climate change science to help preserve the status quo of a fossil fuel-based economy,” Hatt said in a news release.

Schindler, a professor emeritus of biology, spoke with Postmedia about the complaint in 2015.

“What they do is use short snippets of data that support their point of view, and (then) talk about there not being anything settled on climate,” Schindler said.

“Well, recent papers show 97 per cent of people who publish on climate change agree on what causes climate change.”