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.
Senior Manager, Contrecoeur Environment, Montreal Port Authority
Maybe you could talk about the fish habitat at les Îles de Boucherville. That's a big one.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
Oh, yes. One of the big works that we did was in 2012. We constructed 27.7 hectares of fish habitat in what we call les Îles de Boucherville, which are owned, of course, by the Crown and are kept natural. This habitat is working really well.
In the case of the copper redhorse, we had some follow-up that we needed to provide to the environmental department to see whether or not the fish were using this habitat for feeding, and it was seen.
The last time we did this review—the submission was in 2019—it was demonstrated that the habitat was working well.
That was one example for the port of Montreal, where we built 27.7 hectares of habitat for the fish.
Liberal
Wade Grant Liberal Vancouver Quadra, BC
I want to follow up with respect to your answer on indigenous compensation, transfer of indigenous knowledge and their being able to practise their cultures. Is this something that has been taken into account with respect to approval of this project?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
Absolutely. I'll pass this to my colleague Julien, who has worked very closely with the first nations.
Chief of Staff and Vice-President, Communications and External Affairs, Montreal Port Authority
Our responsibility goes beyond the project.
We do have an ongoing relationship with first nations to be part of the truth and reconciliation effort in this country, so we are using the cruise industry and our own spaces to promote this truth and reconciliation and the indigenous culture.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Angelo Iacono
Thank you, Mr. Grant.
Thank you, Mr. Baudry and Ms. Gascon.
Mr. Bexte, the floor is yours for five minutes.
November 17th, 2025 / 12:05 p.m.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Thank you, Chair.
Thank you, witnesses. I appreciate all of you for being here today online and in person.
I want to follow up with the Port of Montreal on one question, about financing. If the MPO didn't exist, would the project have been funded?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
At this particular moment, as you may be aware, there were several contributions that were already announced. The Province of Quebec is putting $130 million into the project. The federal government has announced, through the national trade corridors fund, $150 million.
The project has two phases, what we call the in-water phase and the land phase. For the in-water phase, we started on October 9, and the financing is close to being completely done. On the land side, what remains to be done is a negotiation with the terminal operator that we'll be operating in, so this is why it's hard to answer those questions.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Well, it is and it isn't. It's not a hypothetical question, because this project has been going long before the MPO existed, and it had to have some surety of funding. If that was enough surety to progress the project, it basically had to be all there.
I wanted to establish a baseline, so we could see the impact of the MPO and what the influence is there.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
The impact of the MPO has been very important for the project, because it put us in touch with all of the various.... Mrs. Farrell explained it really well. For example, there's the Canada Infrastructure Bank, the resources of the Port of Montreal and what they can bring to the table, and building a financial structure that will allow the port to deliver this major infrastructure while continuing its operation.
Conservative
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
That includes the Canada Infrastructure Bank, and, if you think about the Port of Montreal as the proponent of the project, our own investment into the project. The Port of Montreal is an autonomous—
Conservative
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
Yes, we would be considered private equity in this particular case.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Okay. Thank you.
Who referred the port project...? It's the other way around: Who notified you that the port project had been referred to the MPO?
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
In our discussion with Transport Canada, with the various players at work—
President and Chief Executive Officer, Montreal Port Authority
—we were referred to the MPO, and the MPO has graciously worked with us.
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
The MPO has told us that Transport notified the MPO that they were going to refer it, so I wanted to see if there's continuity.
Ms. Farrell, I'll go back to you. You mentioned in previous testimony and then again today the list of 500 projects being reviewed. I want to dig into this a bit.
We need to make sure that, with all the different avenues into the MPO and at different levels of maturity, we are able to detect favouritism.
I appreciate your grin and the reaction that inherently there is some favouritism, but it needs to be on merit, not based on who you know, what your connections are and how good your communication is.
Could you explain a little more? Will you publish a list of these 500, or will you publish a list of ones that do not proceed past the stage gates?
Chief Executive Officer, Major Projects Office
I apologize; my Internet keeps going in and out. Can you hear me?
Chief Executive Officer, Major Projects Office
I think your question was, will we publish the list of the 500, will we publish the list of the assessments, and then will we talk about how we picked our different projects?
We are 70 days old, and we have 30 people now furiously looking at everything to ensure that there isn't favouritism, frankly, because my job as the head of the MPO is to ensure that projects that are of national interest or major projects contribute to the economy, the environment—
Conservative
David Bexte Conservative Bow River, AB
Yes, I understand that, but we need to know the process. Transparency is the only way to prevent this from happening.
Chief Executive Officer, Major Projects Office
Yes. Currently, of the 500 projects, we've assessed about 144. We've come down to the current list that has been published. We continue to have a number of projects that we are assessing.
Frankly—and this is the reason I'm smiling—the challenge is that there are way more projects than there are people in the MPO at this point, and our job is to staff up accordingly and be helpful to our proponents. I don't want to have so many projects in the MPO that it's all empty promises and we actually can't come through and fulfill the promise of the MPO.
At this point, as we're assessing projects, we're trying to make sure the intake matches the people we have here. We're trying to staff up in order to be important, and that's what we're doing.