Harper government want to dismantle federal laboratories

I found this story in this really informative Canadian science policy blog. Apparently the treasury board was commissioned to report on the feasibility and the roadmap to dismantle government labs such as Agriculture Canada and the Geoscience laboratory here in Ottawa to either privatize it or transfer it to academia:

"From August to December 2007, the panel scoured the world for models of government S&T commercialization via “major programs of privatization of both regulatory and non-regulatory laboratories and/or through creation of new government agencies that have special authority to pursue private-sector-like activities.” The range of initial transfer arrangements envisaged for Canada spans private-sector involvement to outright divestiture. But the end product is clear: the “partnerships” are to be “the initial arrangement in an evolving relationship” intended to move government science facilities from “a joint sponsorship arrangement involving government to one in which the federal government is no longer involved in ownership, governance or management."