Why does variable references include a space?

Some times when I reference variables, for example in an SQL script a value like '${DIM_DATE}' is in fact translated to ' 20180529'. Note the space in the start. I would prefer if kettle didn't arbitrarily add random spaces to values. Note that this value started as an Integer and was accessed copied to the result rows set and accessed from there. The integer (Java Long) cannot include spaces.