Canadian manufacturers look to North

Canadian manufacturers should be “big players” in building major projects in Canada, the leader of an advocacy group representing small- and medium-sized sector members said Monday evening at a national policy conference in Winnipeg.

Catherine Swift, president of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada, spoke during the opening panel at the conference, organized by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, a think tank headquartered in the Manitoba capital.

The conference, which continued throughout the day on Tuesday, brought together leaders and experts from defence, Indigenous communities, energy, transportation, business and public policy to explore what it would take to move northern strategic utility corridors from proposal to construction.

“The fact that we’ve struggled as a country with building major projects such as utility corridors in the North has been particularly punitive to manufacturing because, naturally, they should be big players in any such project,” said Swift, who was a senior economist at TD Bank before serving as chief executive at the Canadian Federation of Independent Business from 1987 to 2012.

Canadian manufacturers — especially small- and medium-sized ones — could benefit greatly from being able to participate in the construction of these projects, but are often left out because governments and private-sector consortia are involved and don’t extend the invitation to participate, she added.

Establishing utility corridors in the North will offer a means of getting Canadian resources to international markets, Swift said, adding participation and ownership by First Nations in these corridors can provide a model for other major projects in Canada.

“These projects also have the potential to open up parts of Canada that are currently underutilized,” she said. “Yes, there’s challenges involved for sure, but that will boost our GDP and our employment in general.”

Swift added she wonders if this potential will be realized by Canadian companies or foreign businesses. She called on the public and private sectors to reevaluate their procurement practices.

“I would certainly like to see … some requirements for Canadian content through the process of procurement itself,” she said. “It won’t always be feasible — there’s no doubt about that. But other countries manage to do this quite successfully and there’s no reason that we can’t as well.”

Adding one or more utility corridors in the North would positively impact Canada’s relations with the United States, Swift added. “Even though we are pretending we don’t like them right now, let’s be realistic: they will be our largest trading partner for the foreseeable future and beyond.”

The panel also included Michel Maisonneuve, retired lieutenant-general with the Canadian Army; Scott McGregor, a senior fellow and security adviser at Frontier Centre; and Calvin Chrustie, senior partner at Critical Risk Team, a boutique consulting firm.

When an audience member asked who poses the larger threat to Canadian sovereignty — U.S. President Donald Trump or Prime Minister Mark Carney — Chrustie shared something he’s learned during more than three decades of travelling the world and managing conflict in high-risk situations.

“The No. 1 thing to focus on is not the other party, but thyself,” he said. “I don’t want to diminish the other threat (the U.S.), but (what) we should be focusing on is ourselves, and managing ourselves in terms of our interaction, our dialogue and our narrative.”

Around 120 people from across Canada registered for the conference, which took place at the Birchwood Inn.

David Leis, president and CEO at the Frontier Centre, said the think tank organized the event in part because it wants to move the country forward.

“Our country has been in serious trouble in terms of a stagnating economy,” Leis said. “So we’ve got a challenge, but we’ve also got an opportunity. This, we think, deserves a lot of attention, and it’s about trying to make our country again a destination for investment and for business, really.”

Canada needs to build up its sovereignty in terms of defence and with respect to the economy, he added. “They go hand in hand.”

aaron.epp@freepress.mb.ca