Stick with the facts

For a prime minister who claims to champion science and oppose climate change, Justin Trudeau has a strange way of showing it. The funding for Canada’s Climate Change and Atmospheric Research program was not renewed in the 2017 federal budget and will soon expire — meaning the eventual end of a vital, national environmental program.

Yet for reasons that are not clear, Trudeau and his Liberals will not commit to providing the lifesaver grant that would keep this initiative afloat.

Letting the program die would be a serious mistake — and experts are saying so.

More than 250 scientists from 22 countries recently signed a letter to Trudeau, urging him to restore or replace the Climate Change and Atmospheric Research program and warning its elimination means “a crisis is looming” in Canadian climate science.

Yet their reasoned and reasonable plea has gone unanswered.

To be fair to the government, it does pay for work done by government scientists employed by Environment and Climate Change Canada.

It’s not terribly expensive, either. It provided seven projects with $1 million a year for five years. The best known of these projects, the Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory on Ellesmere Island, has been granted a temporary reprieve — funding for 18 more months. The six other projects are cutting research staff and preparing for the end. Surely this government can do better. As the Liberals prepare the 2018-19 federal budget, they should find the cash to keep this major research program going or put something even bigger in its place.

The needs of science and a warming planet demand no less.