Transport committee  Politics should never be mixed with legal issues. There are two clear judgments, and that took four years. These people suffered for four years. There are people who have died. The Castonguay judgment is clear: the aircraft have to be overhauled. Air Canada has to bring its fleet of 400 planes back here.

Transport committee  I come back again to the plan we have submitted to you. We simply want a pause, a 12-month suspension, in the examination of Bill C-10. We want to sit down with you and discuss it. We want you to act as arbitrator in the dispute between us and Air Canada so the list of our demands—which I will not read, since you have them in front of you—is known.

Transport committee  Suppose that we start the maintenance shops back up tomorrow morning. Companies like WestJet are going to want to have the work done here. Other Canadian companies will want that too. Today, no foreign company is going to come and operate here. Foreign companies prefer to employ people who live in the countries where they are located.

Transport committee  Concerning Mr. Trudeau, we did not twist his arm to come with us. He came on his own initiative. At that time, I was working on this with Denis Coderre and Mr. Trudeau came to see me and said: "Jean, I want to go and see the workers. Jean, we have to meet simply to address this issue."

Transport committee  I was there. I could even tell you an anecdote about it.

Transport committee  That might be your job, as—

Transport committee  Let's talk about general overhaul companies. In Quebec, the focus has been mainly on parts repair, but the hub is the aircraft hangars. At present, Premier Aviation has a small base. We are asking to become as competitive as Air France, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines, and Lufthansa, which represent Air Canada's wall of fame.

Transport committee  At present, the big maintenance, repair, and overhaul centres are outside Canada. The biggest of those centres in Canada, Aveos, has been closed. It was closed and it no longer exists. Air Canada decided to sign agreements with its friends at Star Alliance and have the maintenance on its planes done outside the country.

Transport committee  I would simply like to say that companies like A. J. Walter Aviation and Lockheed Martin, which produce components, will go there automatically. They will no longer go anywhere else. That is the solution and it will not cost you a cent to do that. You only have to act as arbitrator to ensure that the prices are as competitive as elsewhere.

Transport committee  It will cost you a bit of money, but that is another story. We will talk about that later.

Transport committee  On the question of centres of excellence, they have to stop throwing up smokescreens. In Manitoba, Air Canada is going to lease hangars that it will then rent to Cargojet. That is somewhat like renting our hangars in Montreal to Air Inuit. It does not mean anything. Let's stop talking about a centre of excellence in Winnipeg.

Transport committee  Madam Chair, I never manage to finish a sentence.

Transport committee  It is not accurate to say that Air Canada was not competitive in general maintenance and overhaul. I can give you copies of all the press releases about the profits made with the sale of Air Canada Technical Services. We are talking about $1 billion. This company was profitable.

Transport committee  We operate in a competitive sector. You have a plan at present to respond to this competitiveness. Air Canada published the Wall of Fame of the best maintenance and repair centres in the world, the places where maintenance should be done. We are talking about Lufthansa Technik and Air France-KLM.

Transport committee  Gilbert McMullen, Mario Longo, and I had an opportunity to meet with Mr. Garneau at the end of November. We spent an hour with him. He told us clearly that the matter was before the courts at that time and he definitely remembered that he had supported us in 2012. We even gave him the statements by MPs Marlene Jennings and Stéphane Dion and by Justin Trudeau, the present prime minister.