Now, Maxime Bernier isn't exactly known as one of the more disciplined members of the Harper caucus, so one wonders whether his climate denial letter to la Presse was sanctioned by the PMO.
The Harper Conservatives have done a relatively good job pivoting from their denialist tendencies in opposition - with Harper himself questioning the science - to adopting different do-nothing arguments in government while staying away from denialism.
But, cracks have started to appear of late (here and here) that go beyond Bernier. The danger to Harper is that his troops believe the hype surrounding the leaked email incident and use this as an excuse to break their message discipline.
If they do, there will be many more slap-downs from scientists, such as the one in la Presse on the Bernier letter who said of him:
"When you're claiming to be talking science, you have to do it using existing scientific standards. These comments show this MP hasn't done his homework. Based on his ill-informed comments, he fails this test."
And, as our recent poll in Quebec showed, that can't be good when you are trying to recruit those voters standing in between you and a majority government - or possibly the opposition bench.
Matt Price
Policy Director
Environmental Defence
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