Evidence of meeting #14 for Environment and Sustainable Development in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was project.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Branden Leslie Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
In order to find out whether you would meet those criteria, what information did you provide to the government and when?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
We've been working with the Government of Canada for years on this project—
Conservative
Branden Leslie Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
The government lives in silos, so it's highly unlikely that the government was able to collate all this great information.
I'm very curious about what information, in the immediate lead-up to being referred, you provided to the Government of Canada.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
I'm sorry, sir, but the work that was done for the Contrecoeur project is work that has been going on for decades. We've been working with Fisheries and Oceans, with Transport Canada, with Finance Canada and with various departments. We had meetings with multiple departments at the same time. People and the departments were very well aware of the importance of this project and the work that has been carried out with this project.
By referring us to the MPO, it allowed us to continue the work, as Mrs. Farrell has clearly stated, to finalize and structure our financing. The major project allows us to have a conversation with all of the departments, bringing everybody together to ensure that we move forward as a federal public service and as a federal project, of course, in a concise and rigorous manner.
Conservative
Branden Leslie Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
You were moving ahead with this project. The government then passed Bill C-5, which you have said you didn't think you were going to need to use, despite there being one outstanding permit still.
I'm curious about two things.
One, if that permit is not approved, will you go to the MPO to have that overturned vis-à-vis the powers under Bill C-5?
Two, since you were planning this project entirely without the MPO, what exactly are you expecting them to do for you other than this newfound offer to get you money?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
In terms of the work we've done to receive our permits, our file was completed in August, so in August we received a letter “L”. We received our first permit in October. We finalized all of our consultation with first nations and with all of the stakeholders involved in the decisions for the permit, and everything points to the fact that the second permit will be received in November.
Mrs. Farrell may be better placed than me to answer this question, but my understanding of the Major Projects Office is that, yes, it is provisioned to accelerate projects—that's one thing—but it also acts as an important one-source or one-stop shop for a project, so if I have a problem or an issue, I go directly to the MPO, which organizes and supports us in finding innovative ways of financing and innovative ways of looking at things.
Conservative
Branden Leslie Conservative Portage—Lisgar, MB
Can I jump in there? What are those innovative ways of financing? It was mentioned that there would be various sources under the MPO that they would find, I assume, as a federally regulated port authority, of entirely public money. How were you going to pay for this project? You were about to start building it anyways, and now the MPO has swooped in with a promise to discover new taxpayer money or funds from across various departments. How were you going to build the project before this?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
At this point, I cannot speak to the financing structure for the project, because we are in negotiations.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
My time is up.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
At this particular moment, we're discussing with the MPO and the various departments that are involved what the best structure would be to finance this project.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Angelo Iacono
Thank you, Ms. Gascon. Thank you, Mr. Leslie.
Mr. Fanjoy, you have the floor for five minutes.
Liberal
Bruce Fanjoy Liberal Carleton, ON
Thank you, witnesses.
Ms. Farrell, I'll go to you first.
Can you clarify for this committee the difference between a project being referred to the Major Projects Office versus being in the national interest? Also, what is your role or your office's role in each of those cases?
Chief Executive Officer, Major Projects Office
There are major projects and there are major projects that are in the national interest. Major projects that are referred to us are in various stages of development. Some of them, like Contrecoeur, are almost all the way through their regulatory process, and there's not much help that they need there.
On the financing question, we are working with these federal projects to see how to coordinate financing from, for example, the Canada Infrastructure Bank and the Canada Growth Fund, as well as looking at whether there are other private sources of capital that can be used to ensure that the Port of Montreal has sufficient funds to continue to build and finish the project in a timely manner. That work is under way, and we expect to be finishing that work soon. We're working closely with Ms. Gascon and her team.
In other cases, projects can be referred and can be sent to us as designated projects, and the differentiation there is that those projects would be in earlier stages. Those projects need a decision about whether or not they should be built in advance of all the work that needs to be done to coordinate the regulatory, the first nations and the work that needs to be done on the financing.
So far, at this point, we have not had any projects that have come through the act as designated projects. Most of the projects we're working on are in various states of development, but we do expect, over the course of time, that one or two projects of national interest will be designated. At that point, there is a single process that allows for a single minister to use the.... We still end up going through all the different departments to do all the work—there's no corner cutting—but it's a bit of a two-step process whereby a decision is made that the project is in the national interest and then a two-year process is undertaken to end up with one permit and one set of conditions for all the different agencies that are involved.
November 17th, 2025 / 11:50 a.m.
Liberal
Bruce Fanjoy Liberal Carleton, ON
That being the case, is it correct to say that all of the regulatory obligations that exist for Contrecoeur are the same as they would have been had this process begun five or 10 years ago?
Chief Executive Officer, Major Projects Office
Currently, all of the regulatory processes that the Port of Montreal has been through with Contrecoeur are well under way and well understood. The permits are close to being completed. There is one more permit, as I understand it, in November. I do not anticipate—our office does not anticipate—that there's any need for any additional assistance there, and we see the same thing on a number of fronts.
What is needed, though, is the final financing package, so that Ms. Gascon and her team have the certainty they need to finish the waterworks they're undertaking, to finish the agreements they're undertaking and to start the major part of the project, which will be finished in five years.
The other work we will do with the Port of Montreal and their team is to ensure that, as they go through the construction process, they have the streamlining they need, so that we do meet the objectives of the build within the time frame that she intends to build in and the project does stay on budget and on time.
Liberal
Bruce Fanjoy Liberal Carleton, ON
Thank you.
Ms. Gascon, can you please outline for us in about 40 seconds the economic impact and the strategic importance of expanding the port of Montreal?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
In terms of any economic impact for the Contrecoeur expansion project, during the construction it's 3,770 jobs. After the terminal is in operation, it's 10,000 jobs, and it supports over 400,000 jobs.
What the phase one of the Contrecoeur project—or this phase for the Contrecoeur project—brings is to increase the capacity of the port of Montreal by 60%. The capacity of the terminal will be 1.15 million TEUs. TEUs are 20-foot equivalents, or containers.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Angelo Iacono
Thank you, Madame Gascon.
Thank you, Mr. Fanjoy.
Mr. Bonin, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.
Bloc
Patrick Bonin Bloc Repentigny, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
For the Impact Assessment Agency of Canada, was an alert sent out regarding the compensation plan?
Executive Director, Communications, Impact Assessment Agency of Canada
There was not an alert sent.
Bloc
Patrick Bonin Bloc Repentigny, QC
There wasn't any alert.
In terms of the port, given that you want good consultations, are you comfortable with the lack of alert and feedback in an important consultation regarding the critical habitat of a species at risk?
Chief of Staff and Vice-President, Communications and External Affairs, Montreal Port Authority
In the past, we've submitted a number of requests through the Canadian Impact Assessment Registry. We rarely receive any feedback.