Trudeau, Pallister hold meeting amid disputes

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/07/2017 (3004 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is meeting with Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister today, and the Free Press has learned the two are expected to announce $50 million in funding for an Assiniboine Park project.

The private meeting will take place this morning at the Fairmont Winnipeg, the Prime Minister’s Office said. Trudeau proposed the meeting, according to Pallister’s office.

Trudeau will hold a news conference at 9:45 a.m. at Assiniboine Park Conservancy, the future site of Canada’s Diversity Gardens, alongside deputy premier Heather Stefanson and Mayor Brian Bowman.

Sources said Friday that Ottawa has tentatively approved a contribution of $35 million for the gardens.

The province, which has already made investments of nearly $34 million in the redevelopment of Assiniboine Park, will contribute $15 million.

Slated to be completed by the end of 2019, the gardens would showcase plants from around the world and charge a $10 admission fee, officials proposed this week.

Some city councillors have been critical of the project, because only bureaucrats have seen its business plan. The city said last week the plans remain confidential, as the park competes with other tourist attractions.

Today’s expected announcement could help smooth over what’s been a rocky relationship between Ottawa and Manitoba ever since Pallister became premier in May 2016.

Pallister and Trudeau have disagreed on myriad issues, from the federal Liberals slowing the increase of health transfers, to compelling provinces to implement a carbon tax, to the July 2018 deadline for marijuana legalization.

The federal Liberals have threatened to launch postal delivery of recreational marijuana in provinces that don’t set a framework on sales and consumption by the Canada Day 2018 deadline.

In March, Pallister pushed Trudeau for more federal funding to accommodate asylum seekers, estimating that roughly 1,200 would be crossing near Emerson this year.

The federal government hasn’t provided more funding.

The RCMP say some 646 people have been intercepted near Emerson, though they’ve registered a continuous decline since the numbers peaked in March.

More recently, Pallister has pushed Trudeau to make a decision on how to proceed with Omnitrax, the company that owns Churchill’s port and flood-damaged rail line.

Last week, the company said it wouldn’t pay the $20 million to $60 million to repair the line.

Trudeau declined an invitation from Churchill Mayor Mike Spence.

In a statement, Pallister told the Free Press all these issues are on his radar.

“Churchill is definitely top of mind right now, but we hope to also discuss carbon pricing and Manitoba’s proposed green plan, the federal contribution to health funding and the ongoing asylum seeker situation among other topics,” he wrote.

“I will also offer our support and encouragement to the prime minister in the co-ordination of efforts to strengthen NAFTA for the good of Manitobans and Canadians.”

Pallister also plans to “express appreciation for working with us on the ‘return home’ of dislocated Lake Manitoba Indigenous peoples,” though many remain displaced from the 2011 flood.

Friday morning, Trudeau told media in Kenora, Ont., that he hopes to clinch a solution to Pallister’s months-long holdout on health funding.

“The time in which Canadians want to see levels of governments fighting with each other is long past,” he reportedly said.

Though Trudeau and Pallister have met at national gatherings, their last one-on-one sit-down was last June, shortly after Pallister took office. (Though provincial ministers have spoken with their federal counterparts during visits to Ottawa and Winnipeg.)

Trudeau arrived in Winnipeg on Friday afternoon.

He plans to leave by midday today to visit British Columbia communities affected by forest fires.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca