Email to online petition signatories

When the federal government proposed prioritizing research grants for business-related degrees, the post-secondary community rallied quickly. Over 20,000 people signed an online petition calling for the policy to be changed back. Unfortunately, at that time online petitions were not recognized by the House of Commons. So we sent this email to everyone who had signed our online petition, asking them to please send up a hard-copy. This email resulted in 17,000 hard copy signatures. 

Dear SSHRC supporter,

Thank you for being one of more than 20,000 people who have signed the petition against the earmarking of SSHRCC grants for “business-related” degrees. The momentum has been tremendous, and we need to keep moving forward.

In order to keep going, I need you to print off the attached PDF of the petition, sign it, and send it to my office. Only the written petition can be formally presented in the House of Commons.

It would be even better if you could have a handful of people sign it as well. If all 20,000 of us were able to have four other people sign the document before sending it in, we’d have 100,000 signatures to present in the House of Commons.

Once you’ve signed it and passed it around please send it to me. You don’t even need a stamp, just put it in an envelope and send it to:

Niki Ashton – MP, Churchill
House of Commons
Room 914, Confederation Building
K1A 0A6

While you’re doing that, I will keep speaking up for SSHRC on Parliament Hill. Despite the passing of the budget, it is still imperative that Stephen Harper hears our message of opposition.  I asked this question last week in the House:

“Mr. Speaker, using smoke and mirrors, the government claims to support Canada’s students and researchers but it is paying $90 million in new graduate scholarships by cutting $148 million in research grants. It is not an increase. It is a cut.

Thanks to the Liberal support for the budget, the Conservatives have overruled arm’s length agencies for their own ideological purposes.

This is an attack on academic freedom.

When did the government decide that it knows better than the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada which projects should get funding and which should not?”

I look forward to continuing to work with you in holding this Government accountable for its attack on academic freedom and research.

Please send the petitions in time for them to arrive at our office by April 3rd, 2009. I look forward to receiving them.

We look forward to keeping you up to date on the campaign.

Thank you so much,

Niki Ashton
MP – Churchill
Post Secondary Education Critic