HomeMy WebLinkAboutHuron Expositor, 2017-02-15, Page 5t
Bombardier deal
bad for taxpayers
No, Bombardier
should not be
loaned hundreds
of millions in taxpayer
dollars. It's that simple.
Yet sadly the case still
needs to be made.
Listening to Navdeep
Bains speak about the
great merits of the Que-
bec company's CSeries •
jet on Tuesday afternoon,
you would have thought
he was the company's
CEO or official
spokesman.
He's not. He's the fed-
eral Liberal innovation
minister and he was
announcing $372.5 mil-
lion in loans handed out
over four years to the aer-
ospace giant for two of its
jet programs - the
CSeries and the Global
7000.
We're left scratching
our heads here. If the
CSeries is so great, why
won't anyone else foot
the bill for it?
Why doesn't Bombar-
dier just go get a loan
from a bank, like regular
Canadians do for their
business ventures or
home mortgage loans?
Throw into the mix
Wednesday's news
that Brazil is seeking
action on this issue from
the World Trade Organi-
zation for what they view
as unfair subsidies and it
gets even more troubling.
(One of Bombardier's
main competitors is
South American.)
Fraser Institute fellow
Mark Milke has done
extensive research and
writing on corporate
welfare in Canada and,
in his book Tax Me I'm
Wednesday, February 15, 2017 • Huron Expositor 5
Canadian!, shows Bom-
bardier is one of the
country's top
recipients.
From 1966 to 2009, the
company received 48
handouts from Industry
Canada that added up to
well over a billion dollars,
adjusted for inflation. No
other company received
as much from the feds
aside from Pratt &
Whitney.
And while, at the time
of those calculations,
Bombardier was the
8thlargest employer in
Canada, only five of the
top 25 employers in the
country received any
handouts.
This is a clear sign
there's no meaningful
connection between job
growth and government
handouts.
Most companies can
and do survive without it.
Bombardier must learn to
do the same.
As we wrote in a previ-
ous editorial urging the
feds to just say no: "The
problem is that the more
a company doesn't have
Canada owes Stephane Dion respect, gratitude
rime Minister Justin
Trudeau made a
shrewd decision for
Canada by replacing
Stephane Dion as foreign
affairs minister days
before Donald Trump's
inauguration as president
of the United States.
The Trudeau adminis-
tration is mounting a
charm offensive in Wash-
ington to steer the coun-
try's most important rela-
tionship through choppy
waters. Dion is a some-
times prickly intellectual
who speaks English with
a heavy French accent.
It's hard to imagine him
hitting it off with the vola-
tile Trump. Chrystia Free-
land, a cabinet star in the
international trade port-
folio, is a stropg pick with
impressive economic
bona fides.
But it is sad to see the
clearly unhappy depar-
ture of a political veteran
who deserves credit for
no less than saving
federalism.
Dion's career started in
the wake of the 1995 ref-
erendum, when Quebec
came within a hair's
breadth of leaving Can-
ada. Then -prime minister
Jean Chretien belatedly
decided he needed to
counter the fundamental
precepts of the sover-
eignty movement, so he
plucked Dion from aca-
demia and named him
intergovernmental affairs
minister.
In open letters pub-
lished in Quebec newspa-
pers, Dion challenged the
arguments of sovereignist
leaders point by point.
These letters were a val-
iant and effective weapon
in the public battle for the
hearts and minds of Que-
becers. He pushed back
forcefully against the
notion Quebec could uni-
laterally declare inde-
pendence, asking the
Supreme Court to weigh
in. He then crafted the
Clarity Act, which laid out
the ground rules for any
province seeking to
secede.
To Dion, we owe two
decades of political sta-
bility and national unity.
He merits recognition
as well for his efforts
fighting global warming.
As environment minister,
he helped salvage the
Kyoto Protocol in 2005.
He was elected leader of
the Liberal party in 2006
on a green platform — a
leader ahead of his time.
Dion's legacy was
clouded recently when,
as foreign affairs minister,
he quietly signed off on
shipping combat vehicles
to Saudi Arabia, a contro-
versial move given
human rights concerns
and the Liberals' pre-
election opposition to the
deal.
Dion's public image
never fully recovered
from the bullying he
endured from the Con-
servatives after he was
elected Liberal leader in
2006. Those attacks
sought to characterize
Dion as feckless and
weak — an unfair percep-
tion given his steely
resolve in challenging
Quebec separatists head
on and his efforts on cli-
mate change.
Politics is a thankless
job. But as Dian leaves
public life, he deserves
our respect and our
gratitude.
to face the consequences
of its actions because of
government bail outs,
the more likely it will
continue the practices
that got it into financial
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trouble in the first place."
At a time when most
Canadians are feeling the
pinch from low growth,
this deal is just plain
wrong.
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