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The war on science continues.
Steve Campana, Canadian biologist, 'disgusted' with government muzzling - Nova Scotia - CBC News
A recently retired Fisheries and Oceans Canada biologist says the muzzling of federal government scientists is worse than anyone can imagine. Steve Campana, known for his expertise on everything from Great white sharks to porbeagles and Arctic trout, says the atmosphere working for the federal government is toxic. The Halifax-based scientist, who only agreed to talk to CBC after he retired from the department, says federal scientists have been working in a climate of fear. "I am concerned about the bigger policy issues that are essentially leading to a death spiral for government science," he said in an exclusive interview. "I see that is going to be a huge problem in the coming years. We are at the point where the vast majority of our senior scientists are in the process of leaving now disgusted as I am with the way things have gone, and I don't think there is any way for it to be recovered."
Public-sector unions have organized rallies in a number of locations across the Ottawa area on Tuesday to protest the alleged muzzling of public scientists. "We have very strict directives of what we can say and the approval steps we have to go through, and very often that approval seems to be withheld for totally arbitrary reasons," Campana says. He says government scientists often have to find their own funding, travel is often turned down and they are rarely allowed to talk to the media, even about their own groundbreaking research.
Steve Campana, Canadian biologist, 'disgusted' with government muzzling - Nova Scotia - CBC News
A recently retired Fisheries and Oceans Canada biologist says the muzzling of federal government scientists is worse than anyone can imagine. Steve Campana, known for his expertise on everything from Great white sharks to porbeagles and Arctic trout, says the atmosphere working for the federal government is toxic. The Halifax-based scientist, who only agreed to talk to CBC after he retired from the department, says federal scientists have been working in a climate of fear. "I am concerned about the bigger policy issues that are essentially leading to a death spiral for government science," he said in an exclusive interview. "I see that is going to be a huge problem in the coming years. We are at the point where the vast majority of our senior scientists are in the process of leaving now disgusted as I am with the way things have gone, and I don't think there is any way for it to be recovered."
Public-sector unions have organized rallies in a number of locations across the Ottawa area on Tuesday to protest the alleged muzzling of public scientists. "We have very strict directives of what we can say and the approval steps we have to go through, and very often that approval seems to be withheld for totally arbitrary reasons," Campana says. He says government scientists often have to find their own funding, travel is often turned down and they are rarely allowed to talk to the media, even about their own groundbreaking research.
