Le retour de l'ascenseur - Mulcair's dirty hypocritical politics come back to haunt him

Anglo friends, take note: this Devoir article reveals that Mulcair, as Minister of the Environment in Quebec, directly intervened to stop Hydro Quebec from funding the fight against climate change.

This is as cut and dry as can be - le Devoir has all the copies of the emails Mulcair sent personally to stop the funding because he didn't like some of the members of the associated groups, worried some were separatists (ed. note: so what?). Emails after the 2006 UN climate summit in Montreal.

The "Centre québécois d'actions sur les changements climatiques" or "Quebec Centre for Action on Climate Change" is an association of most of the environmental NGOs in QC whose goal is to coordinate action to promote the fight against climate change. It has worked with almost every level of government, crown corporations, etc.. Reflecting Quebec society as a whole, were there a referendum, the votes of the members of its associated NGOs would be split, but since it's focussed on the environment, that's neither here nor there.

So this Centre, set up to correspond with the UN summit, was promised $2 million dollars by Hydro but Mulcair went straight to Charest's chief of staff to stop it. Hydro, of course, supposedly an independent crown corporation, and Mulcair actions being against the ministerial code in every way - unless you're a Harper minister of course...

When interviewed by Le Devoir, Mulcair claimed he was working for the public good, defending his ministry against Hydro's interference (he's against funding for environmental groups outside his department?), and trying to ensure the funding was allocated fairly for all groups.

Umm, except that under Mulcair, yearly funding to environmental groups was cut from $2.2 million to $720 000...

Once a tool, always a tool.

Here are some highlights:

Mulcair hanté par son passé de ministre

Il a torpillé une aide d'Hydro-Québec à la lutte contre les changements climatiques

Une série de documents obtenus par Le Devoir montre clairement que M. Muclair s'est ingéré en 2006 dans les affaires d'Hydro-Québec pour empêcher le versement d'une subvention de deux millions de dollars destinée au Centre québécois d'actions sur les changements climatiques.
(...)
Thomas Mulcair a justifié son comportement de l'époque en disant qu'Hydro-Québec venait jouer dans les plates-bandes de son ministère et que ce geste n'avait pas été apprécié. «On voulait prendre notre temps en tant que gouvernement pour s'assurer que tous les groupes environnementaux puissent recevoir de l'argent, et pas seulement quelques-uns. Je travaillais avec beaucoup de groupes à l'époque, et il fallait que ce soit juste et équitable», dit-il.

Pourtant, en 2004, le ministre Thomas Mulcair avait réduit les subventions aux groupes écologistes, faisant passer l'enveloppe du gouvernement dans ce domaine de 2,2 millions de dollars à 720 000 $ par année.