A farm group devoted to promoting grain shipments through Churchill isn’t impressed with new funding for the port.
Arnold Grambo, president of the Hudson Bay Route Association, said it makes no sense for the federal government to pour money into the port while working to dismantle the Canadian Wheat Board.
“Losing the CWB would be a disaster for Churchill, said Grambo. “We’ll have a nice rail line but no traffic moving over it.”
The federal and Manitoba governments recently announced plans to spend $24 million each to upgrade the rail line from The Pas to Churchill and improve infrastructure at the northern port.
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Port and rail line owner OmniTrax Canada will contribute another $20 million toward fixing the rail line, for a total of $68 million.
Grambo said it’s hard to argue against fixing the rail line and the port facilities.
But he said if the government succeeds in dismantling the board, the port will suffer a fatal blow.
“Dismantling the wheat board and upgrading the rail line – does that make sense or does it seem schizophrenic?”
The CWB is the major user of the port, shipping more than 600,000 tonnes of grain through the facility this year. Private grain companies have shown little or no interest in shipping through the port, where they collect no terminal elevation fees.
Port supporters fear that if the board loses its single desk, the port will lose most of its business.
Grambo added that prime minister Stephen Harper, who travelled to Churchill Oct. 5 to make the funding announcement, is aware of the importance of the CWB to the future of Churchill.
The route association president suspects the reason the federal government is investing in Churchill at this time is to gain political support for the next election.
“I think they see this as a winnable seat,” he said. “It’s simply political game-playing.”
