WINNIPEG — Railways will face fines of up to $100,000 per day if they can’t move one million tonnes of crop per week, the federal transport and agriculture ministers announced Friday.
Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Railway have four weeks from an order in council planned to be made Friday to reach that target.
The government also intends to introduce legislation to Parliament “to ensure Canada maintains a world-class logistics system that gets agricultural products to market more efficiently,” agriculture minister Gerry Ritz said.
The measures were announced to a room full of senior grain company executives, farm and commodity group leaders and senior agriculture-related politicians, such as senator Joanne Buth.
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“The railways have dropped the ball,” said Ritz.
“We must get that grain moving.”
Transport minister Lisa Raitt said the railways were not told what the government was going to announce.
“They were not given the heads-up by me at all,” said Raitt.
She said the railways should be able to meet the minimums, since they have hit those levels before and noted that at a meeting last week.
“These are numbers they say they can do,” said Raitt.
The million tonne minimum will be a total from both railways and will probably require more than 5,000 rail cars per week to move.
Farmer representatives at the press conference said afterward they were happy to see action taken against the railways and hoped a permanent solution could be found.
Grain company officials seemed pleased to see action, but one noted that a $100,000 per day penalty isn’t that big for a giant company like a national railway.
