Unions confirm job cuts coming to Environment Canada

About 700 jobs are on the chopping block at Environment Canada. Some employees will be moved into new positions within the department, while others will be offered new jobs in other parts of the public service.

CTV News Extended: Tony Clement speaks

Treasury Board President Tony Clement speaks to the media regarding the job cuts that are to occur at Environment Canada. He says these cuts were not set up by the government to help cut the country's deficit.

CTV News Channel: Job cut at Environment Canada

CTV's Mercedes Stephenson discusses the job cuts that are to come at Environment Canada, saying over 67 government departments and agencies have been ordered to cut between 5 and 10 per cent of their budgets.

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CTV News.ca Staff

Date: Thu. Aug. 4 2011 8:54 PM ET

Environment Canada has sent notice to hundreds of employees that they will be affected by a wave of job cuts that will take place over the next 90 days.

Gary Corbett, the president of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada, says his union received notice about the pending cuts on Monday.

"These type of announcements cause a lot of havoc in the department and people are certainly wondering what is going to happen now," Corbett told CTVNews.ca in a telephone interview on Thursday.

Corbett said a total of 776 Environment Canada employees have since received notices that they will be affected by the job cuts, though not all of them will ultimately end up leaving the department.

Some employees will be moved into new positions within the department, while others will be offered new jobs in other parts of the public service.

"The department has quite clearly said that they expect 300 (employees) to be surplused," said Corbett.

But Bill Pynn, the national president of the Union of Environment Workers, said Environment Canada is using retirement attrition assumptions that may not prove true, which could leave the department unable to hold onto to its workers.

"I don't believe that Environment Canada has the capability to offer, to a large degree, high numbers of job offers within the department," Pynn told CTVNews.ca by telephone on Thursday afternoon.

"If I thought that they were able to do that, I would think they would have done this prior to announcing the degree of cuts that they announced yesterday."

And even if the department can provide other opportunities, Corbett said it is not a simple process to uproot scientists and other professionals from Environment Canada into other jobs.

Dozens of physical scientists and engineers within the department have received notices, as have a smaller number of chemists and meteorologists.

The Environment Canada website says the department has more than 7,000 employees, which implies that about 1 in 10 workers will be affected by the pending job cuts.

The pending cuts have also raised concerns that Environment Canada will be hard-pressed to deliver the services it is required to provide with diminished staff capacity.

Opposition critics say the cuts show the environment is not a priority for the Conservative government.

"These massive cuts are deeply alarming and will result in reduced ability to evaluate scientific issues, such as air quality, climate change, and water quality, and could potentially lead to less-informed decision-making," Liberal Environment critic Kirsty Duncan said in a statement released Thursday.

"Liberals believe that Canada needs more scientists within Environment Canada not fewer -- but clearly the Conservatives disagree."

In a statement released Wednesday night, Green Leader Elizabeth May said: "At the very least, the Harper government owes the public clear explanations of how the core activity of Environment Canada will not be harmed by these layoffs. What is the timeline and what areas of the department will be affected? How will we ensure that critical roles are not left vacant?"

"There are too many questions and no good answers regarding this slashing of a critical government department."

In a statement from Environment Canada to CTVNews.ca, the department said the environment "remains a priority" for the government, "even in times of fiscal restraint."

It noted that the last federal budget committed investments towards cleaning up the Great Lakes, mitigating the effects of climate change, protecting the health of Canadians from contaminated sites, and improving meteorological services.

Comments are now closed for this story

Don
said

Well, the comments here will fall along two lines:Private Sector Worker- fire them all!Public Sector Worker- leave us alone!Fact is, during economic downturns, the Public Sector is always a tempting target for reduction since it's political sucide for the Government to reduce health care payments, pensions, etc. and the comments from the private sector are, well, predictable.Just another swing of the pendulum...

Don in Nova Scotia
said

I have seen these down sizing�s in the past and they do not always mean lay offs. When someone retires they are not replaced. If your job disappears you are offered another position where someone else is retiring. Of course the unions will paint the blackest picture they can as they always do. I think it is time for some of these unions to go as well.

Mike in Pembroke
said

@ Cut the military spending, you must be one of those liberals who want to kill the military every chance they get. Sure cut the military spending then when the government of the day decides to send our young men and women where ever, they are under manned, under equipped and young Canadian soldiers, sailors or air men get killed because you want to Cut the military spending. I bet you or your kids are not in the military!

Alberta Beef
said

Who cares about environment, healthcare and education? We have to spend more money into sand oil fields and army. We need to buy more fighter jets and battle ships..... This is the world where Harper The Conqueror is heading us.

Parker Brown
said

I would like to see the analyses of the programs that are being cut. Generalisations and assumptions are not a good basis for decisions, and not a way to run a government. I hope proper analyses are being done before the cuts are made. Across the board cuts are unwise.A lot gets said about the bad efficiency of the civil service. Based on my many years of experience as a consultant to both large and small businesses, and sometimes government, my opinion is: the larger the organisation the more waste and inefficiency. Some of the large private sector firms I have contracted to are inefficient, and have employees that can evade accountability. Compartmentalizing accountability into small units within the larger organization helps to improve efficiency. We had a surplus when the Liberals were in power, so presumably we can cut back to that again. However, there was quite a bit of controversy about the cuts that the Liberal�s made when we had a surplus.

pegger
said

They've already cut environmental forecasting for all of the prairies to one centre in Edmonton, resulting in sketchy results for the region. Now just pare the rest down to the bone and ask why they can't get it right.
BTW of course with Environment Canada not able to analyze results of the oil patch on the climate Harper will continue to try to sell his B.S. to the rest of the world, which is making Canada a pariah right now.

Proud of our Public Service
said

Hey "Get Real" I think you need to update your rhetoric or stop believing your leader. He is the one that said there wouldn't be cuts to services. People do lose their jobs in government. It is the political appointments who are protected. Maybe you also want to look at the qualifications of those who do get laid off. It might suprise you. You may also be surprised at the low wages these people with masters degrees are getting. Many of the people you and the Tories like to smear really do believe in public service and are not in it for the money. Yes some people really do put people over profit.

spaz
said

Just shuffling chairs.......has anyone EVER EVER EVER seen a government union member tossed out in the cold ????? They wll simply be moved to another department that can hide dead wood.With all the new technology one would think predicting weather would have improved in acuracy in the last 25 years......sorry......environment canada has amazing acuracy at predicting employee wages and benefits.......time off for holidays......and how to wrangle overtime pay.......the weather....oh well.....let's spin the wheel and see what fate has in store....

Tim
said

'bout time. keep the job cuts coming at other gov't dept's as well.

Cut the military spending
said

One of the more useless ventures we've been involved in for the past decade, the invasion of Afghanistan has not yielded anything beneficial for Canadians and only marginal benefits for Afghanistan. As soon as we leave they'll be back to their tribal ways with thugs and drug lords running the country, not that they aren't right now. My point is, it's time to scale back the military spending and worry only about what is necessary to defend our sovereignty. We played soldier boy, we all got our ya-ya's out, put yellow ribbons on the trunks of our cars, now lets bring all our military home and pare it down to what is needed to take care of us and leave it at that. That outta save a couple of billion every year.

Scott (in AB Party Country)
said

How about getting rid of the bonuses for the senior (Environment) staff instead of laying off the workers thus lengthening the (any) process for the client?

Josey Wales
said

Awesome...we could use the space to park our vehicles downtown again...and a few empty houses up here will be welcome too!Win win for all up here anyways, we get some more space...and families in Ontario get re-united with their kin whom left to ride the Federal gravy train to giver a good 12 - 15 hrs a week...in reading their newspapers...steering special interest committees....planning their week-ends...and e-mailing stupid jokes from one office of wind bags to another.

Get Real
said

Some people do not get it, job cuts does not mean layoffs!! It means they will be transferred to another dept.

JD, Ottawa
said

Was this just political shenanigans by Harper all along? Did he go on the MASSIVE hiring spree over the last few years just so he could lay those same people off - giving the illusion of smaller government when in fact it'll just be back to the staffing levels of the last Liberal government? Lest we forget that Harper started off as a member of the Liberal Party of Canada.

JD, Ottawa
said

Carl said "It's simple, folks - we have two choices: higher taxes, or less government spending. I choose the latter." The problem though is that Flaherty LOVES to spend. He was disastrous as Finance Minster in Ontario, after Ernie Eves did a great job and left him in a good position. As long as he's Finance Minister, we're screwed.

Joe
said

If any business was run like the civil service, it would have been bankrupt ages ago over and over again. 99% of the federal service gets entitled and lazy after the first year of service.

PDinVIC
said

Governments continue to downplay the importanceal of the environment - it impacts our health, economy, educationa nd research - yet it is always among the first on the chopping block. And we, as Canadians, seem content to let it happen. Without clean air, clean water, protected species, coastal rainforests and much more, Canada's environment is in danger. Surely there are more effective ways to manage this department. While I suspect some positions could be cut, Environment and funding has never been a priority for this government or any others for that matter.

Doug
said

I don't want civil service cuts but, if it happens, fine.I have worked for privately owned companies all my life and have found myself unemployed through every recession as employers keep their family and friends employed at the expense of "other employees" like myself.Whining? No! I accept it and acknowledge that no one gives a damn. Same for me about formerly secure civil servant jobs. Stop whining and find another job the the rest of us have had to do.

James
said

@ Dave: I understand that cuts need to come to get national finances in order, but 776 EC job cuts seems like overkill. One thing the government could do is cut back on the $1.4 billion in subsidies to the oil industry. An already highly profitable industry such as oil doesn't need such a large subsidy.

Gene Calgary
said

Please wake up and just check the world economic news!

Johnny38
said

Haha, thanks for the good laugh. Nice logic there.

Carl
said

It's simple, folks - we have two choices: higher taxes, or less government spending. I choose the latter.

Paul ~ Kitchener
said

GREAT work Mr.. Minister and stay focused in all area's of the department there are many corrections that need to be introduced. Downsizing is one way ~ Auditing Asset Usage is another & Reducing Salaries & Expense accounts of Corporate Officials is a helluva great place to attack. When you get this environmental mess cleaned up then onto "Other Departments" with the same vigor and zeal. We can be more efficient with less and still be efficient. It only takes workers, instead of sherkers, & Management with salaries that are related to there responsibilites & tight expense controls (there wide open now). Al Gore created this "False sense of Killing the Earth", he only started a hiring surge of dreamers, and soathsayers ~ the World will survive ~ The Sky is not Falling thank you. Go Mr. Prime Minister Go - WE ALL CAN DO WITH LESS !

Bob the Taxpayer
said

So Dave, you're "glad that the working people of Canada woke up and voted in the Cons, or else we would be hiring untold amount of peoples...". I hate to burst your bubble, but the last big government job cuts were done by the Liberals. Since Harper came to power, there has been the biggest expansion EVER of the federal government. These people were not hired to serve Canadians, they were hired to build more layers of mind numbing, soul sucking bureaucracy to gum up the works. It's called "accountability". Way to go Harper.

leegrasse
said

We can all say goodbye to Ottawa and Gatineau economy. Thats what going to happen with all of the layoff. Stop lying Mr Harper.

Green and Clean
said

I guess the real way of cleaning up the environment is to get the environmentalist out of it, eh?

ouifyg
said

The goverment isn't saving money by cutting good jobs, these poor folks will all be on EI before the month is over.

Ian, Antigonish
said

Here are a few things to keep in mind as you bash the civil service.1. Civil Servants pay taxes too, making them your beloved and downtrodden "taxpayer".2. Civil servants spend the money they earn, the part they get to keep after they are taxed, on goods and services provided by businesses. 3. Civil Servants paid for their pensions, and they negotiated lower salaries and reduced benefits to keep them. 4. Civil Servants serve The Citizens of Canada, not clients. So, everytime one gets cut from a budget all Canadians get less service. You can trust there will not be a tax cut equal to the salaries removed, unless it is a tax cut for "businesses"5. Civil Servants run a government, not a business. So, please no suggestions that Canada need business people running the government. That makes as much sense as farmers running the military.6. Finally, if you get rid of all the civil servants (a huge savings to be sure) who would run the government? Do you want Rona Ambrose in charge of the nuclear reactors? I for one do not. After all, it IS rocket science after all� I would prefer if that was left to the rocket scientists�

MikeW
said

@TM who said " Pretty soon the weather forecast will be:"Look out the window - what you see is what you get"So then based on past weather forecasts things will not change except the cost goes down, works for meIf my work was as inaccurate as the weather forecasters i would have been fired long ago

Dave
said

What planet do most of you people live on, apparently it is not the real world. Look at what is happening around the world, I mean this one. There are cuts every where to over paid, under worked Government staff. Who do you think pays their wages, not the money fairy, but the working people of Canada. I am sure if some of you did work, you would complain about your taxes being to high. I am glad that the working people of Canada woke up and voted in the Cons, or else we would be hiring untold amount of peoples for Socolist Government policies. Way to go Harper.

Blake
said

In about a year or two, it will be interesting to hear from all the people who are screaming for cuts in government services because "it's a good thing"...and what will I want to hear?

Well, for starters - if any of them are complaining because there were not accurate weather forecasting models to permit warnings on tornadoes...especially if one plows through their community and kills someone they know. Of course, if they complain, I'll say "Really? Maybe you could pay for your own forecasting".

Or, perhaps if they have issues with their water tables, like "no water", or "contaminated water", because there were too few inspectors to verify that the water was safe. In which I'll tell them "Maybe you could pay for your own water testing".

Of course, the first thing they'll say is "the government's supposed to take care of this". And my comment will be "They did...they made sure there was nothing to take care of."

Be careful what you wish for people - you're very likely to get it.

robinottawa
said

We are fighting amongst ourselves for the crumbs. And the rich are making sure we don't have the education to make cooperative decisions.

The filthy are those that take 90% and make us fight each other for the other 10%.

robinottawa
said

Well, Doug^^^BC, even if you are right that we should cut back, how is it going to help to shrink the part of the pie where you and I live and leave the pie alone and growing where the rich live? Who caused the bloody recession we just had? Public servants or the filthy rich? And who gets hurt by it? You and me bub.

peter in mb
said

I hope the gun registry bureaucrats are the next to get laid off. they cost more then a billion a year in salaries for something that dose not work and never has worked to prevent crime. And please... I�m so sick of hearing the argument that the police access it 12,000 times a day Bull S---. That is simply a lie by the people who want to keep their 50k per year do nothing government jobs.

Duke
said

Then the government will outsource the work to corporate crony for the same money . . . but the workers will get a smaller share of that money . . . and the crony kicks back to Con Party.

Doug ^^^ BC
said

If you want to know what's next "Niagara George" you only have to read the post by "It is what it is". Look around people>Do you alll actually thing we can sit here in Canada,and not be affected by what's going on in the rest of the world.You do know that more than 60% of our standard of living is paid for by the revenue generated by our exports,don't you? How anyone can rationally suggest that we can sustain everything we have now,while the rest of the world looks at their national economies in decline. Since the great credit crunch of 2007,all the world governments have ben scrambling to repair the global economy.And working just as hard to keep us thinking that they actually can do that.What is becoming clearer with each passing day,is that they may not be able to. WHile it's true that Canada's position is likely better than most,in the absence of an economic recovery in the rest of the world,and especially in the USA,we will find ourselves in just as much trouble as everyone else in the not to distant future. Assuming governments can continue with this level of spending withoout an increase in their revenue stream is absurd,and ignortant,.There are two choices.More taxes on us,or fewer services. What the problem is now,is that this slow growth and economic turmoil may now no longer by a short term downturn.It may be on the way to becoming the new norm. Until the private sector begins to grow,things are not going to get better for anyone.So,expect either more cuts,or more taxes.There is no other way out.More of the next generations money is NOT an option.

mememine69
said

We must believe.
We must trust the carbon trading markets and corporations and politicians to manage the temperature of the planet.
We must call it consensus even though all of the thousands of consensus scientists all have their own special, personal and unique views of CO2 climate crisis.
We must trust the good and trustworthy politicians who promise to lower the seas and make the weather colder by taxing the air.
We must continue to believe in climate change crisis despite Obama not even mentioning the crisis in his state of the union address.
We must believe in climate change even though the number of consensus scientists vastly outnumbers the marching climate change protesters.
We must believe in climate change h e l l and spread our love for the planet as we condemn billions to a CO2 death just to make sure the kids turn the lights out more often and vote progressive when they reach voting age.
We must believe even though the thousands of consensus scientists refuse to march in the streets themselves. Don't they have families to save too?
Believe. Believe. Believe so we can defeat the evil bible thumping necons and those ignorant of the ways of THE SCIENCE! Praise be to the SCIENCE.
ALGORE is my shepherd; I shall not think.
He maketh me lie down in Greenzi pastures:
He leadeth me beside the still-freezing waters.
He selleth my soul for CO2:
He leadeth me in the paths of self-righteousness for his own sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of reason,
I will fear no logic: for thou art with me and thinking for me;
Thy Gore�s family oil fortune and thy 10,000 square Gorey foot mansion, they comfort me.
Thou preparest a movie in the presence of contradictory evidence:
Thou anointest mine head with nonsense; my fear runneth over.
Surely blind faith and hysteria shall follow me all the days of my life:
and I will dwell in the house of ALGORE forever.

ron svajlenko
said

How can a government that has been recognized by the world as a under performer in environmental issues, improve??? Answer: HIDE MORE DATA!! Good work Harper!!

Blowhole
said

"Environment? We have one of those?" - Heard in the PMO

TM
said

Pretty soon the weather forecast will be:
"Look out the window - what you see is what you get"

Jim in Ottawa
said

I know this is going to come across as contrarian and harsh, but this is very welcome news that does not go far enough. It is not news that the federal government is grossly over overstaffed, overpaid, and underworked. The worst part is: you and I the taxpayer are paying the underworked and overpaid elephant's salaries and supporting their bloated pension plans, extended vacations, and generous sick leaves when most of us do not have pensions to speak of. In the interest of increasing fairness between the public and private sector, it is absolutely essential that the federal government massively reduce its headcount and do away with the gold-plated defined benefit pension plans. While it is unfortunate to see reductions at Environment Canada, I would like to greater reduction in the number of bureaucrats across all PS departments who really add no value to either their department or to society in general.

Robert Roaldi
said

A good way to get rid of the global warming problem. If no one is left to study it, it will go away. :)

I have no idea how much deadwood there is (was) in that department, but I find it funny when people applaud cuts, complaining about how all those workers were costing us money. How come no one ever criticizes the decades of bad management who allow a place to become overstaffed, all overseen by governments of the day? (And if you believe it matters which party is in office, pardon me while I laugh a while.)

It's a little like blaming unions for destroying GM after 3 or 4 decades of bad management decisions that led to the building of cars that no one wanted to buy, but who paid themselves performance bonuses all the way along.

OK, so the Tories are cutting fat in the civil service, cool, now how about they end tax subsidies to corporations too. That used to be one of the platform planks in the early Reform movement. Wonder what happened to that idea.

TC
said

It is time that Harper trims the size of the government since he took office. Let's just hope Environment Canada is the first to do so and more cut to come in other departments.

Greedy union hater
said

why did they only cut 10%? and they should be cutting everyones pay who works for the public sector by at least a quarter of what they make now. Big bloated government is sinking the rest of the world and we are not far behind! God help us all if the pro-union pro-Quebec group of leftists ever gets a hold of our government.

Joe Spumolio
said

I lost my private sector job last September due to several things. My company couldn't afford me any more, technology made my position unnecessary as it had most the the people who reported to me. It sucks to be laid off but that is the reality of the times we live in. Nobody in the private sector is immune to this and I can see no reason why anybody in the public sector should be either. The ranks of the public sector, especially at the municipal and provincial level are hugely over staffed. As much as I feeel for anybody who loses their job, it's about bloody time public sector workers felt the pinch. I know all levels of government can cut more. Keeps the cuts coming and lower our taxes.

KC BC
said

Cut the waste and duplication in ALL government departments and move on. This is not just Canada, this a worldwide trend.

Sounds great
said

7,000 cut back 3,000 and make them do some work for change. 3.2.1... tree huggers rant

URU
said

Someone has to pay for going green. The green thing is not sustainable because it cost consumers more to go green. You need to replace everything and anything that's not green. Big corporations are not lowering their prices also so going Green is not an option for ALOT of consumers. The environment itself can't be sustained by adding jobs to protect a few wild life and trees. People just need to be wise on what to use and not. The only green that consumers should be aware of today is the green that's in your pockets because layoffs are loaming!!!

The Other Lowell in BC
said

the only place they won't cut is revenue canada because they need to collect the tax dollars.

Old Ted
said

Back in the fifties, I was a farm boy. Come haying season, we were constantly watching the sky and listening to the weather reports so that you got your hay cut and into the barn without being rained on. With all the billions of dollars worth of satellites, monitoring stations and people, the weather forecasts don't seem to be any more accurate than they were back then. Start writing down what is forecast five days out versus what actually happens. You will quickly see what I mean. Accurate forecasting is impossible and we don't need to be wasting so much money on it. A lot more money might be saved by sorting out the CBC. Now, there's a REAL money pit if there ever was one.

Jimmer
said

When the economies of the western world collapse in the near future, we won't have the choice to make selective cuts anymore, enormous cuts will be forced upon us. The collapse is coming. Even as it is all starting to unravel, politicians are still playing the same stupid political games for the same stupid cheap political points.

Martin of NS
said

Time to trim the fat in government! Harper promised streamlining of government services during the election, well here we go! This is probably the first of a few departments to see cuts.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot
said

Get rid of all the EC people pushing the "man made global warming" lies. And why only have comment from Elizabeth May? An explosive study based on NASA satellite data collected over the past decade shows that the planet’s atmosphere traps far less heat than any of the most frequently cited models presumed. The study, by Dr. Roy Spencer and Dr. William Braswell of the University of Alabama, was published in the peer-reviewed journal Remote Sensing. Skeptics have long been able to point to inconvenient facts that cast doubt on the climate alarmists’ consensus — for example, the fact that temperatures have apparently risen much less slowly in the last 20 years than in the 20 before that, although everyone agrees there is more CO2 in the atmosphere now then there was then. But this is virtually the first time that central assumptions and predictions of the models used by the International Panel on Climate Change — the basis of climate policy and treaty negotiations around the world — has been flatly refuted by hard evidence. The precise theory of the climate alarmists has been falsified by factual data — and must now be modified or abandoned, which is what happens to most theories. The “chaos theory” trend of 20 years ago was right after all — we don’t know everything, in particular where the climate is concerned. The planet may be warming — but there are far too many potential causes for us to really understand what is happening, or to predict what will happen in coming decades. But this is hopefully the beginning of the end of the Enviromental Left's demented fascination with imposing devastating burdens on the economy in the service of a “scientific” consensus that is now facing death by a thousand inconvenient truths.

Mom for the Environment with no waste
said

I work very closely with employees from Environment Canada. I work in a job that works to protect the environment now and beyond. However, I also know of the wasteful duplication of effort and laxidasical attitude of some of the employees. No better place to cut funding than here. Good Job PM Harper. There is a more efficient way of protecting the evironment without the waste..Let's put that waste to energy. By the way, for all of you anti-cons, did you see the most recent announcement that the ecoEnergy incentives have been reinstated by the feds? Is that not helping the environment AND the people?

KevinHamilton
said

Conservatives want to conserve everything except for the environment it seems. Oh well, new generations can deal with it... kids need to learn the hard way anyways. They don't need clean drinking water, let them figure out how to do it themselves... it'll only make them stronger.

Peter in MB
said

Okay people before you start your Harper bashing did you ever consider that maybe Environment Canada is getting rid of the dead weight scientists, meteorologists and engineers that are useless and can not predict the weather from a hole in the wall. Seriously When someone predicts thunder storms and rain for the next 3 day in your city and then you have 3 days of blue sky and sunshine, They are not vary good at their jobs are they? And they should not have them. So stop with the oil sands conspiracies and dictator comments. No where in this article did it say that the government was cutting funding!!! So Grow up!!! Environment Canada have told union members that they do not have enough funding to pay for the employees on their payroll. This looks like an internal clean up of the useless dead beats the do nothing on the pay role..

MARG MM
said

With a department of 7000 employees, I'm sure the Government will be able to make cuts without affecting the main purpose of Environment Canada. All Government departments are overbloated with staff, and I am glad we finally have a Government that will weed out the ones that aren't really necessary.

Nickanese
said

Nothing will change because Harper is going to pocket all the money anyways..

Patlal
said

I have worked for the federal government before and it is ridiculous how many employees just take long breaks and lunches because they have nothing to do. 100% of the current could be done with 50% of the employees.Its been 20 years since a PM had the guts to cut in the public sector. Go for it!!! It about time

Raj
said

I have only one thing to say.Good!

Prof. Pye Chartt
said

Oh, I'm utterly certain that, unlike all other federal government departments, Environment Canada is a lean and efficient machine devoid of bureaucratic waste. (By the way, who/what is the Green party? Huh? You mean that one-person political show that nobody takes seriously? Okay.)

HARPERHASTOGO
said

Enviroment Canada:The most important government department, the department that protects the enviroment we live in. SHOCKING to say the least.It just leaves one speechless.

Niagara George
said

The Conservatives don't need these people to follow their policies. First, they eliminated most of the food inspectors, because the packagers will look after safe processing. Then, the mandatory census, because neoCons don't need population statistics to make their decisions. Now, they plan to get rid of meteorologists and other scientists because those people only provide useless data to the Con decision-makers. Who will be next? Will it be the people at consumer products testing? After all, the consumer can figure out if the toaster has a short as soon as he plugs it in. Keep up the good work, Steve. We are safe in your hands. Not!

SMRT
said

This government is so SMRT they don't need no stinkin science. They use something more reliable than science. They use their gut. Bad will come of this.

Jeremy
said

Ok, you know what? Yes Harper has total domination over all of us now for the next 5 years. Tinker all you want with the economy, but my god it is wrong to take an axe to the only department in the country responsible for protecting the environment. If anyone needs to see the effect of lax environmental laws, just check out the Sydney Tar Ponds. But that will pale in comparrison to what the north will look like once the fat cats are done with the Oil Sands.

Margaret Med Hat
said

ALL departments need to be scrutinized to ensure that the Canadian taxpayer is getting the "best bang for his buck". That includes departments like the Environment. Where would Ms May like to make cuts to reduce the deficit and balanace the budget? Education? Social Services? Who does she want to keep taxing to support the Environment department at its current staffing levels? Seniors? The unemployed? Sorry, Ms. May. You're "barking up the wrong tree" to me.

Steve
said

I live in Ottawa. I know lots of people who worked at Environment Canada or who work there now. The stories of mismanagement and waste are endemic and disturbing with layers of duplication that are not necessary. We do not need all these bureaucrats. This is a good move by the Government. It is not an attack on environmental services or the environmental movement. It is an attack on waste and duplication. Our country can no longer afford the levels of waste we see emanating from Government departments and agencies. This is a good start.

It is what is IS
said

Actually, all government departments are going to reduce staff by 10%, saving taxpayers millions and strengthening Canada's financial position so we don't end up like the U.S. of A. Sound fiscal management is a foreign concept to enviornmental tree huggers. Liz May needs to get more facts if she wants to appear less dumb.

Mark in Wpg
said

Why would anyone be surprised by this? Harpo and Co. are massive proponents of Bush style conservatism; if any government department publishes anything that disagrees with the direction the cons are trying to push the country then they are superfluous and need to be removed. Expect massive cuts to Stats Canada in a few weeks since things like facts and reliable data have no place in a conservative Canada.

Jackie Barrett
said

With more cuts coming to enviornmentally friendly programs and government departments linked to environmental measures, I'm definitely suspecting that the Harper Government's pro-polluter and pro-oil stance may have something to do with it. Now most Canadians are learning a valuable lesson that applies to every aspect of life, including politics, garbage in garbage out.Hopefully, many Canadians will learn from their mistakes in voting Conservative and not vote for them in 2015.

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Labour Minister Lisa Raitt appears on CTV's Power Play on Monday, May 28, 2012.

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