OTTAWA — The Alberta government is hoping to kickstart a new discussion among federal and provincial governments about investments in more resilient infrastructure in the wake of devastating floods that struck the southern part of the province.
As premiers gather for a retreat later this week in Niagara-on-the-Lake, this along with job training will likely be the key economic issues on the agenda with several governments sharing common ground, including the host, Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, who also wants her counterparts to jointly call on the federal government to commit to reliable funding for strategic investments in transit, roads and bridges.
“In Ontario, building new transit, roads and bridges is critical to creating jobs, reducing congestion… strengthening our economy and contributing to our future success,” Wynne’s office told Postmedia News. “In other provinces and territories, stable funding from Ottawa would allow for important investments in road networks and harbours — creating good jobs in every part of the country.”
Wynne’s government also indicated she wants the other premiers to find common ground in challenging a new federal job training program by “asking the federal government not to take a one size fits all approach given the different needs of provinces and territories.”
Quebec, which has touted the success of its own organization — a commission bringing together business, government, community and academic interests to promote job training — is also challenging the proposed federal plan, arguing that it doesn’t need this interference with its own constitutional jurisdictions.
“The issue of job training is a priority for us,” said Marie Barrette, a spokeswoman for Quebec Premier Pauline Marois, who will meet with Wynne for the first time. “We expect to reaffirm that the federal government must respect the jurisdiction of the provinces and allow any province that does not want to participate in the job grant program to be able to withdraw with compensation.”
In terms of infrastructure investments, Alberta Premier Alison Redford explained through a spokeswoman that all levels of government could benefit from working together in building cities that can withstand extreme flooding and other disasters.
“They’re very traumatic and sad things to go through and they disrupt so many lives,” said Redford’s spokeswoman Neala Barton, referring to recent flooding in Alberta and other provinces. “So there is a large-scale financial cost as well, so we want to talk to other provinces about how we can prevent floods like this from happening in the future and how more co-ordination on mitigation measures might help.”
The federal government committed in its 2013 budget to extending and indexing a dedicated fund for infrastructure projects through a gas tax revenue sharing program, and must now negotiate renewing a series of existing agreements with the provinces and territories to distribute the money.
Infrastructure Minister Denis Lebel wants those agreements to be in place by March 31, 2014, said spokeswoman Marie-Josee Paquette, who noted that the last budget provided more than $50 billion in new and existing funding for provincial, territorial and municipal infrastructure.
She also said that disaster mitigation would also continue to be a category eligible for investments under the federal government’s infrastructure spending programs.
The main lobby group representing cities also said that new infrastructure investments must also factor in adaptation needs to a changing climate.
“It’s pretty clear right now that we have to live with climate change,” said Claude Dauphin, president of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, noting the apparent increase in extreme weather events striking cities in recent years. “I think we have to be realistic about the situation right now.
Dauphin said the federal government had a role to play, in partnership with the other governments, to sit down and share information about how Canadians could prepare their infrastructure for a changing climate.
The provinces and territories are also expected to continue discussions on a national energy strategy, as well as an exchange of views on Senate reform in the federal Parliament.
