Colin Mayes, Conservative MP for Okanagan Shuswap, isn't sure that we're responsible for global warming. Climate bloggers think he's incompetent.

In a response to a constituent's email, Mayes writes:

Climate warming is happening. Just what the cause is has yet to be substantiated. Is it Co2 in the atmosphere, sun activity, or cyclical? Is this a trend that will change as we have seen recently in cooling of temperatures and rebuilding of ice caps?

... Saying this I am careful not to over react and spend billions of taxpayer dollars because a few scientists say CO2 is causing the planet to warm. Scientists, when I went to school, said that there was a coming ice age. They also said that the ozone layer was disappearing over the Arctic. (Remember the “Black Hole” that ended up being just the 24 hour sunlight (Ultra violet light) breaking down the ozone layer in summer? Then this was reversed during the 24 darkness of winter. This proved to be a natural occurrence). This resulted in millions spent on observation and scientific research.

Scientists theorise many things, some prove to be true some not. I want to make certain when I vote my vote is supported by sound scientific facts and less media hype.

In a post on DeSmogBlog, Richard Littlemore writes:

Mayes says he doesn't want to "spend billions of taxpayer dollars because a few scientists say CO2 is causing the planet to warm."

Against the findings of the Nobel Prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, against the opinion of the Royal Society of Canada, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and all the other science academies of every major nation on earth, he distinguishes himself as a shockingly ill-informed representative.

Mayes's response was picked up by The Globe and Mail, as well as VernonBlog.

Mayes's own website has nothing about this incident. Its featured post is from April 20, saying that CBC "needs to adjust its operating costs to reflect the realities of the current economic climate."

Crawford Kilian is a contributing editor of The Tyee.