Evidence of meeting #15 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was million.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Liberal
Angelo Iacono Liberal Alfred-Pellan, QC
I don't see $6.8 million. I think you may be referring to $6.9 million or is it $7.7 million?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
Correct. Yes, I'm sorry. The $6.8 million is for the maintenance centre and the station, and we have $100,000 for decontamination, so it comes up to $6.9 million.
Liberal
Angelo Iacono Liberal Alfred-Pellan, QC
When you say “decontamination”, of what exactly: which sites, and whom do these sites belong to?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
Martin, do you want to answer?
Chief Commercial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
These are VIA Rail properties. We have a number of sites that require decontamination, for example, fuel spillage that needs to be cleaned up. This is an initial sum of $130,000 that was awarded to launch the program of decontaminating some of our sites.
Liberal
Angelo Iacono Liberal Alfred-Pellan, QC
Are these sites, for example, your maintenance centres, or are these sites which the general public makes use of?
Chief Commercial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
There are some in the maintenance centres and some at the stations as well.
Liberal
Angelo Iacono Liberal Alfred-Pellan, QC
Will VIA Rail prioritize safety upgrades for crossings and security at VIA Rail stations, or “state of good repair” investments? What would you be doing?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
In the supplementary estimates (A) envelope, it's going to be for station and maintenance centres, but we will come back to this committee in September for supplementary estimates (B).
You were referring to $7.7 million before, and that will be treated in the following supplementary estimates, which means in September.
Liberal
Angelo Iacono Liberal Alfred-Pellan, QC
Is any of this money going to be used for operational activities?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
Part of the $7.7 million is for operational activities, such as fleet renewal studies that we will be doing during this year.
Liberal
Liberal
Angelo Iacono Liberal Alfred-Pellan, QC
What about new trips? Will any new trips be installed? New runs?
Chief Commercial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
The schedule will include one additional frequency in 2016, in the corridor. That is what is currently planned.
Liberal
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Thank you, Madam Chair.
These are questions again for VIA Rail.
In our other conversations, we've both had a nodding agreement on the need for sustainable, predictable funding if you're to get a capital plan that you can perform to. Do you actually have a capital plan on a shelf somewhere just waiting for the day that somebody comes along and recognizes your need for long-term, predictable funding?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
We were lucky to get a three-year funding envelope in 2014. At that time, we estimated $60 million as the yearly requirement for capital. We are presently working with Transport Canada to make sure that we are going to get sustainable funding in the next following years. It will be around $60 million a year.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Will that $60 million then allow for the replacement of your rolling stock?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
No, this is a different project. As you can imagine, it's much more than $60 million a year. We're talking about $1 billion.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
What form will the ask for that $1 billion take, and when and to whom will you be making that ask?
Chief Financial Officer, VIA Rail Canada Inc.
Well, as you saw, in the last federal budget we got money to do the pre-procurement activities in order to be able to replace this fleet. We hope to be able to submit a plan to Transport Canada next fall.
Liberal
Ken Hardie Liberal Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC
Okay.
This is generally for Transport Canada, but it's an issue that I brought up with Minister Sohi as well when he came.
With the sudden outflow of infrastructure money to come, a lot of municipalities, a lot of entities, obviously will be looking to suppliers to provide those new buses or the pipe for the sewers, or whatever. Has there been some consideration about how best to stage the flow of new procurements in a way that doesn't overwhelm the supply chain, if you will, here in Canada? For instance, if we're going to order a bunch of new buses from New Flyer or Nova Bus, we don't want to have the phenomenon of the snake that's just eaten a cow, and you have this big lump of orders coming through. Has there been any thought about how to properly stage this so we get reliable, predictable employment for a number of years?
