Finance Committee on Feb. 12th, 2026

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Is it a writeoff?

[Ehren Cory]

Madam Chair, to the second part of the question, no, our financial statements are very clear about what our current financial writeoffs are.

However, I can confirm that our investments in electric fleets continue to be viable investments, and we intend to collect.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Okay.

I would like to go now to the president of the Canada Infrastructure Bank.

Lion Electric went bankrupt, so any taxpayer money that funded the acquisition of these vehicles is effectively null at this point in time.

I'll pivot here, if you don't mind, Mr. Cory. There was an arrangement made behind the scenes with Lion Electric regarding vehicles, which included a bank syndication with the Bank of Montreal. BMO is one of the signatories on there. It's interesting that the Bank of Montreal has an arrangement with Export Development Canada to make sure they never have to suffer any losses on their loan portfolio. Effectively, the people of Canada are underwriting bad investments facilitated by your organization without any oversight.

Is this proper due diligence on your organization's part, or are you part of the effort to work through the capital here and make sure Canadian taxpayers are always at risk in these programs?

[Ehren Cory]

Madam Chair, I'm not sure I fully understand the question.

I'll say this. We conduct, on every loan, full due diligence. In the case of electric fleets, our borrowers—who are the fleet operators—sign on to acquire electric buses, decarbonize their transportation and pay us back out of the operating savings that come from the reduction in fuel use and maintenance. That's the due diligence we focus on and do on each and every investment.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

It looks like you've written off a $50-million loan to a U.S. entity that was going to look at doing some business in Canada. You've written off what might be $400 million for another investment in electric vehicles in Quebec, as well as another $15 million. It's probably more for this whole fleet of zero...electric buses, a concept you've leaned towards. The beneficiaries of this, of course, are a bunch of intermediaries. With Lion Electric, as we've clearly shown, the beneficiaries were the insiders.

Is one of those insiders, Andrée-Lise Méthot, on your board?

[Ehren Cory]

First of all, just to dispute the very premise of the question, I've never said anything.... Your comments about what we have or haven't written off are not matched. Just to be clear, those are not all projects we've written off.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

A bankrupt company, you haven't written off your investment in them.

[Ehren Cory]

We don't have an investment in that company. I think I've been quite clear. I don't have a loan to them. The premise of the question doesn't feel—

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Do you have a loan to the people who were arranging to buy those vehicles?

[Ehren Cory]

We have a loan to people arranging to buy non-emitting buses and put them on the road.

By the way, this is an important point. The way our loans all work is that when we sign a financing agreement, the agreement is that they can draw money as they actually make progress, as buses are on the road. To pick a different example, if I made a loan to someone doing broadband, I may make $100-million financing, but they only draw money as they build the infrastructure.

[Greg McLean, Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Mr. Cory, what's the writeoff?

[Ehren Cory]

Our financial statements are very clear on what writeoffs we do and don't take. I'm happy to provide those to the committee, if you wish.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Cory.

Thank you, Mr. McLean. That concludes the time.

We will continue with Mr. Sawatzky for five minutes.

[Jake Sawatzky, Liberal, New Westminster—Burnaby—Maillardville, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you for coming today, Mr. Cory and Mr. Duguay.

I'm very excited to hear about investing in the right way. You mentioned the electrical intertie and growing the electrical grids and supply. I think that's really important going forward. I come from British Columbia, where of course we have a lot of hydroelectric.

I'm wondering if you could speak to the importance of expanding the electrical grid and maybe tie it into B.C. In my own municipality of New Westminster, the municipality actually has its own electrical grid. Maybe just speak to the importance of growing our electricity supply at this moment in time.

[Ehren Cory]

It is such a critical time for us to be investing in our electricity supply—generation, storage and grid—for two basic reasons. One, electrons are the lifeblood of a growing economy. In British Columbia, for instance, our investments in electricity are also investments in growing the critical minerals sector in the northwest, or the energy sector in the province, or the competitiveness of businesses who are manufacturers. It's the same in other parts of the country, whether that's data centres or energy production. Electrons are the lifeblood of that.

Two, we need to grow our grid while also decarbonizing the stuff we do have—moving off of coal, for instance, not in B.C. but in other parts of the country. To put it simply, we have to replace a bunch of the stuff we have and then build a bunch of new stuff. That is what's putting a real burden on the affordability of these investments on Canadians, because all of that eventually falls on ratepayers, electricity payers, in the country.

We're very focused on this. Building good transmission grids also helps that, because you can now spread out the generation and build reliability. Those interties and grid investments are also really important. Battery storage and other forms of storage also form the balancing act. Those investments are core to the CIB. Recently we passed $5 billion in investment in that space and continue forward.

[Jake Sawatzky, Liberal, New Westminster—Burnaby—Maillardville, BC]

Absolutely. Thank you very much.

Can you maybe dive in a little bit further and speak to the efficiencies that electrification provides? I'm thinking about heat pumps in homes, more EV chargers and people having maybe even batteries within their homes. How can that improve the efficiency and even affordability of people's daily lives in Canada?

[Ehren Cory]

The interesting thing, as you say, is that these things all do feed on each other. The CIB has investments in clean power and battery storage and transmission. We also have investments, as you point out, in high-speed electric vehicle charging networks across the country. As one of the earlier questions pointed out, we are planning on accelerating that, linked to the automotive strategy that was recently released.

Decarbonization of our building stock is a really important part of what the CIB is also doing. We have the building retrofits initiative, where we're working with building owners to convert to heat pumps; to move off fossil generation for their heating and cooling; to retrofit their buildings; and potentially to convert their buildings in some jurisdictions from office to residential, for instance. We've seen that in some markets.

What I'm saying is that there's a real chain of investment from the generation and the electricity system into the end use, whether that's chargers or decarbonizing buildings. Together, I think those investments are building the core of what we'll need in order to be economically competitive and meet our climate goals in the future.

[Jake Sawatzky, Liberal, New Westminster—Burnaby—Maillardville, BC]

Thank you.

In the minute I have left, maybe I can ask two really quick questions.

In my own riding, I have a lot of extensive rail lines going through: CN rail, CPKC and SRY. Could you speak briefly to the trade corridor investments?

[Ehren Cory]

One of our investment sectors is trade and transportation corridors. I know your riding well, only from the rail maps. It is one of the more congested, busier parts of the country. We've certainly been looking at ways to debottleneck and grow trade all the way through, not just at the port, but working your way back up through the rail network.

We've invested in inland facilities. I mentioned in one of my earlier comments a facility in the heartland outside Edmonton. It's really to help shippers get their products more quickly to port. It's a rail handling and logistics yard.

We've made investments, obviously, in the passenger side of rail, but we're looking very much at other logistics handling facilities inland to complement, again, if you follow the whole chain, our port investments that we've made in Prince Rupert or in Montreal, or that we're looking to make in Vancouver.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karina Gould]

Thank you, Mr. Cory.

Thank you, Mr. Sawatzky.

Mr. Garon, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Thank you very much.

I'll go back to the representatives from the Canada Infrastructure Bank.

You wrapped up your answer earlier by telling us that the high-speed train was an investment opportunity, which basically doesn't say much. Anything can be an investment opportunity. It's kind of an empty phrase.

How is it that this is an investment opportunity that you have not taken advantage of so far?

Why didn't you seize that opportunity?

[Ehren Cory]

I appreciate the chance to clarify. To be clear, the high-speed rail in that corridor is a project that has huge benefits for Canadians. It meets all of our criteria for investment. It's a project the CIB worked on in the earlier phases of developing the project. When the time comes, it would certainly make sense as a project that we, alongside private capital, invest in.

The only answer to the member's question is that it isn't yet time for a CIB investment. It's premature, but we remain in discussion with them, and when the time is right, I suspect it will be a project that we'll be very proud to be investors in.

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

I have a follow-up question.

There's already capital. We're already putting together a financial package. We know that the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec—your partner in the REM project, in particular—has already stepped up to take part in this project.

I'm trying to understand how your organization works. How is it that the timing is right for the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec to invest in the project, but not right for the Canada Infrastructure Bank?

I'm having a hard time understanding why you're trying to, no pun intended, catch the train at the last minute.

[Ehren Cory]

Thank you for the question.

To be clear, yes, it's really exciting that there is progress happening—early works, as we call it in the infrastructure business—on the ground in early phases.

To answer the member's question, the project is still in the process of finalizing the total cost of the project, the construction schedule and the contract—

[Jean-Denis Garon, Bloc, Mirabel, QC]

Very quickly, do you think it's likely that the project won't go ahead?

Is that your concern?