Nipissing MPP and Minister of Economic Development Vic Fedeli is in the middle of a battle after Bombardier announced 550 Thunder Bay workers will be without work by November of 2019.
However, Premier Doug Ford and Patty Hajdu, a federal cabinet minister and MP for Thunder Bay-Superior North, have been going back and forth casting blame on each other.
Hadju said $8.3 billion in federal infrastructure money was available over the past year for transit projects in the GTA, but Ontario has yet to ask for it.
Vic Fedeli got into the conversation as well.
“Minister Patricia Hajdu is doing a disservice to her constituents by playing politics with the livelihood of Bombardier employees whose jobs are now at risk if the Federal Liberal government does not quickly commit to funding the full federal share of Ontario’s historic $28.5 billion transit expansion plan," Fedeli noted in a statement to BayToday.
"Instead of working with the province to support Ontario’s historic $28.5 billion transit expansion plan before the election, Minister Hajdu would rather play politics, than push her cabinet colleagues to approve a plan that Bombardier can bid on, build cars for, and keep good-paying jobs in Thunder Bay.
"While Ontario has met with Bombardier, Unifor, and offered to purchase $100 million of vehicles from the plant in the last month; where was Minister Hajdu? She’s been missing in action, not engaging with her provincial counterparts, and instead blaming everyone but herself and the federal government,” said Fedeli.
North Bay used to be the site where Bombardier's internationally renowned water bombers were built from 1999 until April of 2016. After an up and down market, which dropped after 9-11, Bombardier finally announced they were leaving North Bay in October of 2015.
With files from CP and TBNewswatch
