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Ottawa ‘Muzzling’ Scientists, Panel Tells Global Research Community

For almost three weeks after David Tarasick published findings about one of the largest ozone holes ever discovered above the Arctic, the federal scientist was barred from breathing a word about it to the media.

Kristi Miller was similarly gagged from granting interviews about her own research into a virus that might be killing British Columbia’s wild sockeye salmon, despite going to print in the prestigious journal Science.

Such incidents aren’t one-off occurrences, but instead represent a trend of “muzzling” policies being imposed on Canadian scientists by federal agencies under the Conservative government, a panel told their international peers Friday at a global science conference in Vancouver.

“It’s pretty clear that for federal scientists, Ottawa decides now if the researchers can talk, what they can talk about and when they can say it,” senior science journalist Margaret Munro, with Postmedia News, told a group gathered at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting.

“We’re not talking about state secrets here.”

The views were aired in tandem with the release of an open letter by a coalition of six science and communications organizations, who jointly called on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to “tear down the wall” that’s been raised over the past four years separating scientists, journalists and the public.

“Despite promises that your majority government would follow principles of accountability and transparency, federal scientists in Canada are still not allowed to speak to reporters without the ‘consent’ of media relations officers,” the letter says.

It adds that far too frequently, journalists encounter “unacceptable” delays and denials for interviews.

“Increasingly, journalists have simply given up trying to access federal scientists, while scientists at work in federal departments are under undue pressure in an atmosphere dominated by political messaging.”

This, honestly, is scary.  Science needs to be kept free of politics, because sometimes, scientists are going to find things that are not politically safe, and this needs to occur and be released without bias or spin, because only then is the public able to make their own opinions and force their political parties to do something.

This is doubly disturbing given that we are currently giving foreign aid to mining companies (THE BIGGEST ONE IN THE WORLD, ahem) and are looking to turn oil into our major primary export.

We are doing things that should have rigorous, independent monitoring of environmental impact and human impact.  Not sanitized reports where the government considers the political impact of ‘what happens if the public knows this?’

Because really, the more they think the public might react unfavourably, the more the public has the right to know.