Mr. Speaker, with regard to (a). there are two agreements currently in place with respect to the NextStar Energy battery plant in Windsor, Ontario. The first is the Contribution Agreement with NextStar for the construction of the plant under the Strategic Innovation Fund, or SIF, and the second is a Special Contribution Agreement, which was negotiated as part of the Government of Canada’s response to the U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, or IRA.
The SIF received approval to enter formal negotiations of the Term Sheet on February 26, 2022, while negotiations with respect to Canada’s response to the IRA were initiated after a letter was sent to the company on November 25, 2022.
The SIF received approval to finalize the Contribution Agreement on July 22, 2022, and approval to finalize the Special Contribution Agreement was received on June 29, 2023.
With regard to (i) of part (b), NextStar’s SIF Contribution Agreement was executed on September 30, 2022. With respect to the Government’s response to the IRA, no agreement had been reached prior to May 15, 2023. Since this time, the Special Contribution Agreement with NextStar was executed on July 5, 2023.
With regard to (ii) of part (b), the obligations of the government under the SIF can be found on the Projects: Strategic Innovation Fund site. The site provides an overview of all announced and active SIF projects.
Information with respect to the government’s obligations under the Special Contribution Agreement was released in a statement from Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada. The statement can be found on the site Canada and Ontario Establish An Auto Pact to Secure Stellantis-LGES and Volkswagen deals.
With regard to (iii) of part (b), the document title of the SIF agreement is: NextStar Contribution Agreement. With respect to the response to the IRA the document title is: Special Contribution Agreement for Lithium Ion Battery Manufacturing in Canada.
With regard to (c), as previously indicated, NextStar’s Contribution Agreement with SIF was executed on September 30, 2022. The work phase of the Stellantis project dates back to August 16, 2021, meaning the recipient is able to submit claims for eligible supported costs dating back to August 16, 2021.
With respect to Canada’s response to the IRA, the Government of Canada did not have an agreement in writing with Stellantis prior to August 16, 2022.