'Free' your scientists, Harper told
“Since Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative party won power in 2006, there has been a gradual tightening of media protocols for federal scientists and other government workers. Researchers who once would have felt comfortable responding freely and promptly to journalists are now required to direct inquiries to a media-relations office, which demands written questions in advance, and might not permit scientists to speak.”
Postmedia News has documented several instances in which government researchers have been prevented from speaking to journalists about their studies. One instance involved an Environment Canada researcher who was not allowed to discuss a report he co-authored on last year’s unprecedented Arctic ozone hole. In another instance, a federal geologist was prevented from discussing a prehistoric flood that occurred 13,000 years ago.
