What follows is the most irritating kind of report in the world:
TORONTO — The Conservatives' environment plan favours the oil sands, leaves taxpayers to foot the bill for industry, and doesn't explain how any drop in greenhouse gas emissions will be achieved, says a leading environment group. In a harsh review of the government's proposals, the Pembina Institute says its month-long analysis of the figures left them with dozens of questions.
The government says it will reduce the carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent by 2020.
But Matthew Bramley, director of the Pembina Institute's climate change program, says the government has pegged that reduction to emissions levels recorded in 2006, when the Kyoto Protocol is based on 1990 levels.
Using a different base year for emission levels gives a “misleading impression of their [government] adequacy,” Mr. Bramley wrote in his report released on Monday.
Now let me tell you why this is the most irritating kind of report in the world.
The Pembina Institute is a left-wing environmental lobby that has received several hundred thousand dollars in government funding. Nowhere in the article are these important facts noted.
I have no objection to Pembina receiving media coverage -- they put out a report! But please identify them properly.
Why is it that whenever the Fraser Institute or the Montreal Economic Institute are cited, they are called "the right-wing ( ... ) Institute" but the same standard is not applied to the left? A neutral report would have written the second paragraph as follows:
In a harsh review of the government's proposals, the Pembina Institute, a left-of centre environemntal lobbying organization that has in the past received government funding, says its month-long analysis of the figures left them with dozens of questions.
This is one of the many hurdles conservatives face in the media.
