Thank you.
My name is Jennifer Murray. I am the Atlantic regional director at Unifor.
Thank you to the committee for allowing us to contribute to your study of the Via Rail high-frequency rail project.
I come from a family of railway workers. My grandfather was a locomotive engineer with CN; my dad worked at CN; my brother is a Via Rail employee; and I have been a proud employee of Via Rail for 27 years, starting out at the train station in Sackville, New Brunswick, which unfortunately is now closed, along with many other stations across Canada.
Unifor represents the incredible hard workers who have built, maintained and serviced Via Rail's infrastructure, including those working face to face with the travelling public, since before it became a Crown company through the privatization of CN Rail and an order in council, which would have actually been better served as a legislated Via Rail act.
To start, let me say that we are very supportive of investments in passenger rail in Canada. Unifor and our predecessor unions have long advocated for massive investments in higher-speed and dedicated intercity passenger rail services. We believe that public passenger rail has always been an obvious and necessary solution to the unique weather and geographic conditions in Canada.
However, Unifor is very concerned about the use of public-private partnerships, especially when it comes to transport. No matter how many attempts there are to call these structures “modern”, they are simply subsidies to commercial interests that end up costing taxpayers more money to get a service rather than doing it in-house. Report after report has shown this, and yet here we are again saying it will be different this time. P3s for operations are a leftover from the previous era of ideologically driven privatization. Decades of failures of this model show there is no magic to be found and no actual competition resulting in higher-quality services, because transport like this is a natural monopoly.
Unifor has a lot of experience dealing with railway employers, public and private. We know first-hand how tight the grip on these operations needs to be or they extract a huge price. We also know that Canadians were promised, and deserve, a passenger rail system that is accessible, reliable and affordable. All that is going to happen here is further fragmentation of the rail system, making it even harder to achieve a common vision for green transportation of the future. This fragmentation of HFR and Via already shows that the focus of providing service to the entire Canadian public has been undermined. These services cannot be determined in isolation. Quality public transport should not just be between current economic centres. It is about expanding the potential of all Canadians, no matter where they live, a comment we have heard from municipal leaders across this country.
Interest in commercial investments in one part of the system cannot be allowed to cannibalize needed investments in the rest of the system, a false division created by the plans for partial privatization. Are we really to believe that we do not have the expertise needed to run the corridor but we do have it for the rest of the system? Either the government is saying they don't have any intention to develop the rest of the system, or the excuse for HFR is not valid. The fact that the RFP involves two state-owned European rail companies just shows how ridiculous the notion that we need private sector expertise is.
We see the current process as a delay tactic, as a way to involve more consultants, repeating the studies that have already been done, to build something we already know how to build, a delay because it is an expensive project and there is a constant fear of spending big money. You don't build big things without spending big money, and a delay of true investment now means even more spending.
Constant delays have already had an impact on the rest of the rail system. Underinvestment in the rest of the passenger rail system relegates much of our intercity passenger rail to enthusiasts, history buffs and communities of people who rely on Via Rail to get to where they need to be. The lack of proper planning for a functioning public passenger rail system is the cause. Studies and consultations are carried out and then shelved, as if the goal were the study itself, as if the ideas will result in someone else building it. But passenger rail systems do not work that way. They are built and supported with public money. They must be regulated and refined constantly to facilitate upgrades. This is a costly endeavour, like all transport systems. In fact, if we look to other countries, including just south of the border, they can be a model of how proper investment in a public passenger rail system is done and beneficial.
Because they are costly, we must also make sure the wealth created by building and operating these systems stays right here. Rail is about nation building and economic development—not just the products and people who roll across the tracks, but the building, maintenance and work done to keep it going. If we continue to privatize these services to companies outside of Canada, or anywhere, we forgo a significant part of the economic benefits of building rail and further divide our rail system.
Unifor recommends that the government review the HFR structure and take some bold steps in investing in a real public passenger rail system, one the whole nation can be proud of.
Thank you.