Mr. Speaker, this whole deal smacks of political manoeuvring and, as the Leader of the Official Opposition said, only a royal commission will get to the bottom of it once and for all.
People in Canada, and especially in Metropolitan Toronto, have the right to know the truth and to be assured that there will be no undue compensation for these contracts which seemed to favour the friends-friends in the broader sense of the word-of the parties which succeeded each other at the helm of the country.
Mr. Speaker, if the Official Opposition, the Bloc Quebecois, is asking for a royal commission, it is not to delay the work which is to take place at both airports because-let me tell you- Metropolitan Montreal knows only too well the devastating effects of uncertainty about airport development.
Allow me to highlight the devastating effects of the development of what became the two Montreal airports. I will stress how important it will be for Transport Canada and then for the Toronto Airport Authority to take over and redevelop Toronto airport because, otherwise, any future expansion at other airports, including Montreal, will be seriously limited.
But, let me remind the House that when it comes to airports, long term forecasting is very dicey. In the mid-sixties, the federal government decided to build a second airport in Montreal, Mirabel airport.
In 1967, it was projected that, by 1985, passenger traffic would be 14 million. In reality, things turned out quite differently.
In 1985, passenger traffic in both Dorval and Mirabel was only 7 million, half of what was originally expected.
We know how important an adequate airport infrastructure is for the development of a region. Why? Because it is the entrance
point for investors and the departure point of human and material resources going abroad. It is a considerable economic lever.
My colleague mentioned the 1987 Transport Canada study on Pearson airport which states that the direct economic impact of the airport on the province is in the order of $4 billion-that was in 1987-and that Pearson accounts directly or indirectly for 56,000 jobs. On the other hand, when adding both direct and indirect jobs and induced ones, the total number in Montreal is 48,500. Economic development involving airports stems from the carriage not only of cargo but also of passengers.
I would like to point out that Toronto had a narrow escape when the federal government decided Toronto also should have two airports at a respectable distance from one another. The second one was to be located in Pickering, but the people of Pickering protested and managed to convince the authorities not to develop this second location, but to develop a second terminal at Pearson instead-a third one was added later on, as we know-on a site easier to integrate.
Toronto had a narrow escape, but Montreal was not so lucky. In spite of all our protestations-and as we know, farming was precluded for many years on some of the best arable land in the region-two separate airports were built in Montreal, airports that together, did not achieve together the results that had been projected for just one previously. The federal government paid no attention to the wishes of the people or the airlines. It must be noted however that had rapid, direct service been provided between the two airports, things might have turned out differently. In 1975, a high-speed link had been announced; it was to cost $400 million, but the project never got off the ground.
For any number of reasons, the airport in Toronto flourished and today, it is on the way to becoming a hub airport, "hub" being, as I understand, shoptalk for a traffic exchange point, a place that both companies and passengers are interested in.
Because Montreal's two airports are poorly connected, from 1969 to 1983, the gap between Montreal and Toronto increased from 27 per cent to 116 per cent in terms of passenger carriage. That is very substantial. The adverse effects of inefficiency in Montreal impacted not only the development of the airport, but also economic development. Worse yet, the federal government delayed handing over to the municipalities, the community, in Montreal the management of their airport. It is imperative that in Toronto, the municipalities, the community, rapidly assume the management of the airports.
Just think that provided sufficient investments were made by the federal government both in Toronto and in Montreal, we could have two hubs: one in Toronto, with its own potential, and one in Montreal, as a point of entry for the Eastern part of the country.
I therefore conclude that we are calling for a royal commission of inquiry not because we want to slow things down-because we are all aware of the effects of uncertainty on economic development-but because we believe it is absolutely imperative that the manoeuvring surrounding the development of both terminals, as well as that of the third one, be dissolved, reversed and the only way this can be done, in our view, is not by striking a deal behind closed doors, but through a royal commission of inquiry.