Environmental Leakage

Today, the Globe is reporting on a secret cabinet document it received outlining the Conservatives plans for Environment Canada. But how on earth did the reporters get their hands on a cabinet document of all things? Cabdocs don't fall out of the sky and land on fortunate reporters in Ottawa, it takes someone with a bone to pick with the government.

Cabinet documents are very secure documents. Very few people have access to them in Ottawa. Since the cabinet submission in question outlines cuts to programs for Kyoto, I'm guessing it's someone moderately ticked off that their hard work just went out the window. Enter Samy Watson, stage left.

Samy is the Deputy Minister of Environment Canada, and a Liberal appointee. Rumour has it, Samy was appointed by Chretien at his wife's urging. During his tenure at Agriculture Canada, he created havoc in the bureaucracy while authoring farm aid programs of absolutely no use to anyone. My guess, he's peeved his little fiefdom is falling down around him.

So the government wants to cut funding for Kyoto programs. Good for them! BILLIONS of dollars were allocated for programs that had no measurable impact on achieving results. Loads of money went to environmental lobby groups so they could turn around and preach to Canadians about their dirty habits.