Oh, Canada.

*Updated: I found this article on a Canadian academic website that explains some of the Harper attacks on science with more eloquence and detail than I can muster. Recommended reading for Canadians and non-Canadians alike*

One of the running jokes for liberal Americans is that if the Republicans / Conservatives win an election, they are going to move to Canada. Canada being that lovely, fluffy, kind country to the north of the US that is known for being liberally minded, environmentally aware, having sensible gun-control laws, universal health care, and generally just being a progressive, socialist, European-flavoured version of the US. They even correctly spell many words, such as flavour, although they do share the US obsession with the letter "Z" (e.g. bastardized vs bastardised). But at least they pronounce it "zed" and not "zee".

Unknown to most people, in the last 5 years Canada has been lurching horribly to the right under the leadership of the Conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper (not to be confused with Steve Harper, the former Newcastle United goalkeeper). The first time that I heard of Stephen Harper was on my first visit to Canada, when there was a furore over the fact that he prematurely dissolved parliament for the holidays to avoid a vote of no-confidence that would have brought his government down. Even then, the signs were clear that this guy was a bit of an arsehole but, at that time, his party didn't have an overall majority in the Canadian parliament so the damage he could do to the country was limited.

All of this changed in 2011 when Harper won an overall majority in the Canadian parliament, allowing him free reign to start undoing all the things that have made Canada great. I would need several blog posts to go through the terribleness of the Harper regime in full detail, so I'll stick to just the highlights from his assault on the environment and scientific research. One of the first things that he did with his overall majority was to withdraw from the Kyoto protocol, which pretty much sets the scene.

Every year in Canada and the UK, the government brings a budget bill to parliament for approval. Unlike the US, where failing to pass a budget shuts down the government, voting down a government budget bill in Canada or the UK is considered a vote of no-confidence in the government which, by convention, means that a general election has to take place to form a new government. This means that voting against the budget is very much a nuclear option that no politician will have the stomach for.

Harper has exploited this by introducing omnibus budget bills spanning several hundred pages that pack a myriad of law changes spanning everything from environmental legislation through to rights of aboriginal peoples. Last year, he used these bills to strip First Nations tribes of rights allowing them to defend and benefit from resources in their territory. He also used the bills to repeal environmental protection laws such as abolishing the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, removing the oversight of regulatory bodies on major projects and giving the final say to parliament, allowing the National Energy Board to grant permits for development even when they will threaten endangered species, and many more things. Click on some of the links I've provided, as I'm barely scratching the surface - he's also cutting funding for the arts, removing legal oversight of the security services, etc...

He removed $31b from health care and weakened food and drug regulations, including giving the Health Minister the right to exempt products from legal oversight at will and removing the Canadian Food Inspection Agency from government oversight. Harper has also been doing terrible things to the Fisheries Act  including removing habitat protections, reducing the law to only cover fish of "economic interest" and any development that crosses a river, seabed or whatever can only be halted if it will actually cause harm to those fish that are of economic or sporting value. Oh dear.

Harper is a conservative, big business, big oil kind of guy. Most of his policies are aimed at "cutting red-tape" and making it easier to exploit oil resources, but he claims to be trying to save money. I wonder how much of the money he is saving (actually, I know - $65,000) has gone towards plastering Washington, DC with Canadian government-sponsored adverts supporting the Keystone XL pipeline - something so environmentally-damaging that even the US thought that it was going too far.

Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the Harper regime is its assault on science and the gagging of Canadian government-funded scientists. Harper has introduced rules that prevent any government scientist from talking to the media about their research; when they can speak, they are only allowed to answer questions pre-vetted by the government and in some cases, can only give interviews in the presence of a government minder. All very dark and Orwellian. The international science community is taking notes of this, with Nature running a series of damning news articles and editorials. Canadian scientists are still protesting against this, but this government is not for turning.

It gets worse. Last year, the Canadian government announced that it was cutting funding to the ELA, the Experimental Lakes Area, a 61-year old scientific experiment that has a closed lake system which has allowed hugely important research to take place. Science from the ELA has proven that fertiliser use causes algal blooms, demonstrated how methyl mercury accumulates in fish and goes up the food chain, revealed the mechanisms of acid rain, documented greenhouse gas release from hydroelectric reservoirs and demonstrated how oestrogen in contraceptive pills feminises male fish. The lakes would already have been closed if it wasn't for the campaign of Diane Orihel, who was doing her PhD at the time and managed to make lots of noise and find some alternative funding streams to support the ELA. Harper has also slashed funding for environmental research in his 2012 omnibus bill and has cut funding for basic research in favour of that for applied science.

It gets even worse. This year, the Canadian Government massively changed the remit of the National Research Council, the main funding body for building scientific infrastructre, demanding that the agency only fund projects that are useful for industry. The NRC has cut its priority areas to just five:  health costs, manufacturing, community infrastructure, security, and natural resources and the environment. The Harper government has been truly awful for Canadian science.

So why do I care, or bring this up? Well, I'm quite fond of Canada for a start. Given that my wife is Canadian, we have a vested interest in her country not going to ruin while we're living abroad. Once we've finished playing here in the US, we will need to choose a country to settle in and raise our little ginger babies.

Dom does environmental research so it's becoming increasingly clear that her type are not welcome in Canada. I research basic neurophysiology so, while my research is important, it's not going to immediately lead to breakthroughs in disease or produce something that is readily monetisable. That's not how science works. While I often talk about what I see as flaws in the US, one advantage that America has is that it understands the importance of funding basic research both to produce new solutions to environmental and health problems, as well as helping to drive a knowledge-based economy. George Osbourne, take note.

Ironically, given how Canada has changed under the Harper regime, it is the Republicans in the US who should be threatening to move to Canada: Harper is trying his hardest to make Canada a place where they would feel at home...

Canada, sort your shit out!