Federal MPs Given Summer Recess 'Homework' Reading Assignment

OTTAWA, June 19 /CNW/ - WWF-Canada and the Pembina Institute have joined
forces to give all 308 MPs a climate-change homework assignment for their
summer holidays.

Today, the two environmental groups delivered packages to every MP's
office containing The Weather Makers, a best-selling book on global warming by
the renowned science writer Dr. Tim Flannery, and Oil Sands Fever, a recent
Pembina Institute report about the environmental impacts of the escalating
development of Alberta's oil sands. The books will be in MPs' hands by
Wednesday, just in time for Parliament's summer recess.

"Parliamentarians have spent a lot of time on climate change this
session, between a motion, a private members' bill, and almost daily questions
in the House," said Matthew Bramley, the director of Pembina's climate change
program. "We're glad to see all that work, but we want to remind MPs that this
is much more than just another partisan issue. This reading assignment should
tell Parliamentarians - more eloquently than we can - about the enormity of
what's at stake."

"We decided to hand out climate-change homework as a novel way to get MPs
prepared for one of the most critical policy debates this country has ever
faced," said Lorne Johnson, Ottawa Bureau Director for WWF-Canada. "Hopefully,
MPs from every party can work together to put Canada on a path to the deep
reductions in greenhouse gas emissions needed to prevent catastrophic climate
change."

http://www.cnw.ca/en/releases/archive/June2006/19/c5009.html