Ottawa still mum on Churchill port closure strategy

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This article was published 02/08/2016 (3389 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The federal government is still not prepared to say how it will address the crisis at the Port of Churchill, eight days after the staff were laid off and the port shut down.

Jim Carr, the minister of natural resources, and the senior Manitoba cabinet minister in the Trudeau government, said Tuesday he is gathering intelligence on the ground and is meeting with mayors and chiefs in Winnipeg Wednesday.

“This presumably will be a new chapter,” Carr said about the history of the operation of the railway and the port that has faced many operational challenges since 1997 when Omnitrax acquired the railroad from CN and the port from Ottawa.

“The operators of the port and of the railraod have determined they are no longer interested in those operations,” said Carr. “The government of Canada will look at the impact of those decisions on the people of the north and the people along the line.”

Carr would not give any indication what sort of action is being contemplated. He said there has been no communication that he’s aware of between Omnitrax and Ottawa.

“The government of Canada will assess the impact of these announcements (by Omnitrax), we will talk to the people who are most affected, namely the people who live in Churchill and the people who are dependant on the railraod then across the government of Canada we will determine the appropriate next step,” he said.

When Carr meets with civic leaders and parties closely connected to the port and rail line Wednesday, he’s going to hear them call for the federal government to re-nationalize the port.

That’s what Churchill Mayor Michael Spence is calling for. It’s also what the the 73-year old advocacy group, the Hudson Bay Railway Association, wants.

Elden Boon, president of HBRA, will be at the meeting.

“It is critical that we get involved with the federal government on this,” Boon said.

“It is going to take the feds to implement change up there. For one thing, the port needs to be re-nationalized.”

The Hudson Bay Railway Association is particularly interested in the movement of grain to the Port of Churchill. Boon said it was a “drastic” move to close the port because lots of grain was in place to be shipped there this year. He said there will be huge repercussions from the port shutting down.

“Our association has spent 73 years promoting the port and this this might be the most challenging situation we have ever had to deal with,” he said.

Regardless of what actions Omnitrax is currently engaged in, Carr, the former CEO of the Business Council of Manitoba, is well aware of the sentiment that Ottawa should play a larger role in the operation of the port.

In 2011, when Carr was the CEO, the business council released a short report called A Northern Strategy for Manitoba.

Among other recommendations, the report said, “The governments of Canada and Manitoba should declare the Port of Churchill and the Hudson Bay Railway as critical national infrastructure. We need to bring the federal government into the discussion with strong support from the province and the business community. Manitoba cannot go at this file alone; the expenditures are too large and the national ramifications justify federal government involvement. Good policy and appropriate investments will improve Canada’s competitiveness and stimulate economic growth.”

Don Leitch, Carr’s successor as CEO of the business council, echoed those sentiments Tuesday.

“The federal government has to be a part of any solution,” Leitch said.

Now that Omnitrax said it wants to sell the operations, Leitch said it seems clear no one wants to buy it unless there is public money involved.

“If the public puts up the money, why give it to a third party, irrespective of how deserving they may be, if you are the one financially backstopping the whole thing?” Leitch said. “That is the problem.”

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca