Governments not offering The Pas immediate financial rescue

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This article was published 23/08/2016 (3328 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The provincial and federal governments are offering open ears, but not necessarily open wallets, after the largest employer in The Pas announced Monday it will close.

Political reaction to the impending closure of the Tolko pulp-and-paper mill offered no immediate financial assurances to the 300 people who will lose good-paying jobs that are rare in the northern community.

Provincial Growth, Enterprise and Trade Minister Cliff Cullen said the new Conservative government will listen to anyone with ideas for long-term sustainable development — but won’t commit to bailout money.

“We’re always open to listening to people who want to invest in Manitoba,” he said.

Cullen said he talked to Tolko before the company announced its closure, but he repeatedly refused to tell reporters on Tuesday whether the company has asked the province for financial or other assistance. He also would not say what tangible assistance the Pallister government might offer to keep the facility open or attract a new operator.

Cullen and Natural Resources Minister Jim Carr met with reporters following the annual meeting of ministers of energy and mining in Winnipeg on Tuesday, but the media mainly wanted to ask them about the back-to-back blows to northern Manitoba — the loss of Omnitrax in Churchill and Tolko Industries in The Pas. Omnitrax recently shut the port of Churchill and reduced rail service to once a week.

Carr said Tolko did not notify the federal Liberal government of its plans to close its facility.

“Your heart goes out to the people who lost their jobs,” said Carr.

He noted the federal government has hundreds of millions of dollars available to help businesses create a green economy. Without making specific promises to The Pas, Carr said the federal government is offering “significant investment” in green technology, such as financial help to convert forest waste into biofuels.

“We have literally hundreds of millions of dollars” in the 2016 budget, said Carr, emphasizing that government has to look both at the impact of its investment on jobs and on environmentally-sustainable practices.

Cullen said the province has no interest in providing bailouts or short-term solutions. although “we feel for those individuals, for those families”.

He repeatedly pointed out Tolko owns the facility and it is up to the company to decide what to do with it, including selling the facility.

“We’re optimistic there’s potential there, be it a mill or something else,” Cullen said. “We want to do everything we can to attract jobs…market ourselves to the rest of the country, to the rest of the world.

“We’ll be working with the community to see what opportunities might exist.”

Cullen said that Tolko blamed the closing on a combination of low commodity prices, a shrinking market for heavy kraft paper — the lumber mill already closed eight years before — and aging infrastructure.

“It’s tough for government to do anything when it’s low commodity prices,” said Cullen.

Earlier Tuesday, Association of Manitoba Municipalities president Chris Goertzen said the AMM will do whatever it can to help all the parties talk over possible solutions, but won’t tell government what to do.

“It starts with a dialogue about the challenges,” said Goertzen, the mayor of Steinbach. “There needs to be an appropriate dialogue take place.

“It’s important that each situation may be unique. They don’t want to see handouts, they want to see solutions,” Goertzen said.

NDP labour critic Tom Lindsay said in an interview that one of the smaller bargaining units at the mill had just approved a new collective agreement, and had no inkling the company was about to close.

Lindsay was not sure the mill could be converted to another use, but said government should be looking at whether it can help with transportation or energy costs. Government can provide money or loans if the investment is worthwhile, he said.

Omnitrax and Tolko came out of nowhere, Lindsay pointed out. The MLA for Flin Flon, Lindsay said there are always fears about the long-term futures of the mine in Flin Flon or the smelter in Thompson.

“These are huge, huge things, particularly in the north. Who knows what is coming?”

nick.martin@freepress.mb.ca