Massive contract at stake.
Ontario shipyard Heddle Marine has filed an official complaint at the Canadian International Trade Tribunal, alleging that the federal government is unfairly favouring a Quebec company in the bid for the third shipyard to be included in the national shipbuilding strategy.
According to a CP report, “The winning yard, which will join Halifax’s Irving Shipbuilding and Seaspan Marine in Vancouver in the massive naval procurement process, will be tasked with building six new icebreakers for the Canadian Coast Guard.”
“However, Heddle alleges in its complaint that many of the requirements the government says shipyards must meet to qualify for consideration are not legitimate or reasonable — and will disqualify virtually every yard but Davie.”
In the complaint, Heddle says “No shipyard in Canada that is eligible to apply for the contract is capable of satisfying this requirement except Chantier Davie Canada.”
That ‘requirement’ refers to the fact that the winning shipyard must either have a current contract or recent contract building a ship that weighs over 1,000 tonnes, and must have the ability to launch vessels that are wider than 24 metres.
No Ontario shipyard meets those specifications.
The report also notes that Justin Trudeau has made comments that seem to favour Davie, having said “We recognize that it’s an opportunity for Davie to apply to become that third shipbuilding facility because there will be a tremendous amount of work in the coming years.”
With an election approaching, and with the Liberals seeking to gain seats in Quebec to offset expected losses elsewhere, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see that the feds have skewed or even rigged the process in favour of a specific company for their own electoral interests.
Ontarians should certainly be concerned to see their companies being so unfairly treated by the Trudeau Liberals.
Spencer Fernando
Photo – YouTube
