TORONTO - The government will not support an NDP bill calling for a buy-Ontario program for all public transit projects, but will instead develop its own policy to ensure provincial infrastructure money translates into more Ontario jobs, Premier Dalton McGuinty said Tuesday.
McGuinty said 82 per cent of provincial money allocated for public transit projects is already spent in Ontario, but he'd like to see more of the money -- and the subsequent jobs created -- staying in the province.
"We're putting billions of dollars into public transit infrastructure, and of the funds that we put in there, we're going to create about 190,000 jobs,'' McGuinty said before a Liberal caucus meeting.
"The issue is -- especially in these challenging times -- how many more jobs could we squeeze out of that money?''
NDP critic Gilles Bisson called McGuinty's 82 per cent figure misleading, and said his bill would require 50 per cent of the total contract value of any public transit project and 100 per cent of the final assembly to be spent in Ontario.
"The reality is that if you look at contracts that have gone out, in a lot of cases over 50 per cent of the construction has been done outside of Ontario,'' Bisson said.
"The 82 per cent is an interesting number that, at this point, I'm not sure where they're pulling it from -- maybe out of his hat.''
In the legislature, McGuinty dismissed attempts by NDP Leader Howard Hampton to have the Liberal government adopt Bisson's bill, warning that it could compromise the ability of Ontario companies like Bombardier in Thunder Bay to build subway cars for the global market.
"We will not be supporting the NDP bill because carried out to its logical conclusion, it will compromise our economy and result in lost jobs,'' McGuinty said.
"We'll come forward with something which I think is thoughtful, reasonable, responsible and effective. I know the leader of the NDP can afford to be reckless and throw off caution, but I think we've got to be careful and make sure we don't compromise the Ontario economy, we don't lose Ontario jobs.''
But Hampton said McGuinty was just trying to muddy the waters, and insisted that a buy-Ontario program wouldn't limit the ability to sell rail cars and buses outside the province, and would only match similar programs in other countries.
"The premier is trying to confuse the issue,'' Hampton said.
"You should know that 98 per cent of the subway cars ordered for German cities are manufactured in Germany, and 100 per cent of the subway cars for French cities are manufactured in France. What does the McGuinty government have against sustaining good manufacturing jobs in Ontario by bringing in a buy-Ontario policy?''
Earlier Tuesday, McGuinty thanked the federal government for finally coming up with its $300-million share to buy 700 new hybrid buses for the City of Toronto, and said he would be looking for ways to get more Ontario jobs out of infrastructure investments.
"That's something that we're considering, and we want to make an announcement on that sooner rather than later,'' he said.
But Bisson complained that the majority of the 700 new diesel-electric hybrid buses being purchased for the Toronto Transit Commission will be built in the United States, and said that money would be better spent maintaining jobs in Ontario.
"Clearly 60 per cent of those hybrid buses are being built in the United States, not here in Ontario,'' he said.
"It's sound fiscal policy if the province is going to spend dollars on infrastructure, to buy buses or rail cars, they should be doing as much of that as possible here.''
