the announcement<\/a> at the Alstom facility in Thunder Bay Thursday morning. The prime minister said the work will be done on 313 passenger rail cars for Via\u2019s long-distance, regional and remote areas fleet.<\/p>\nAn accompanying media release said the cars will be manufactured and assembled at Alstom facilities in Thunder Bay and La Pocati\u00e8re, Que., with design and engineering work taking place in Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, Que.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the first time in four decades, those cars will be produced and assembled and maintained in our country,\u201d Carney said.<\/p>\n
\u201cCars that used to be built in the United States will be built right here in Thunder Bay at Alstom.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to the federal government, it will be the first time in four decades that\u00a0Via passenger cars will be built in Canada. Ottawa also claimed in its release that it is the “largest investment in Via\u00a0Rail\u2019s history and in Canadian intercity passenger rail in a generation.”<\/p>\n
The contract will support nearly 700 jobs in Ontario and Quebec and generate more than $1.6 billion in economic benefits, the government said.<\/p>\n
The contract will provide “a guaranteed 10 years of solid security for our members,” Unifor Local 1075 president Justin Roberts said, adding that he’s still awaiting all the details. Unifor represents hundreds of workers at the Thunder Bay Alstom plant.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“This one, specifically, is definitely going to result in the hiring of a couple hundred workers for sure in the immediate future, but only time will tell exactly how many members this will bring in.”<\/p>\n
The company is also expected to use and expand its network of more than 900 Canadian suppliers in doing the work, while “maximizing the use of Canadian steel in structural assemblies, supports, and fabricated metal elements,” federal officials said in their release.<\/p>\n
Some of the Via stock set to be replaced is more than 70 years old, the federal government said, adding that its\u00a0long-distance, regional\u00a0and remote fleet is nearing the end of its useful life.<\/p>\n
“Replacing that aging fleet will deliver safer, more reliable, and more modern service for Canadians\u00a0while creating good jobs and building more of what Canada needs at home,” the government release said.<\/p>\n
Carney’s announcement comes as Canada and the United States remain locked in a trade war, with the latest round of negotiations breaking down Aug. 21.<\/p>\n
The prime minister pulled Canadian negotiators\u00a0back, saying that demands the U.S. brought to the table at the last minute would have undermined Canadian sovereignty.<\/p>\n
\u2014 With files from Leith Dunick<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The work will go to Alstom plants in Thunder Bay and Quebec. THUNDER BAY \u2014 Prime Minister Mark…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":195136,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[111,61155],"class_list":["post-195135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mark-carney","tag-mark-carney","tag-via-railalstom-thunder-bayalstom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=195135"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/195135\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/195136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=195135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=195135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=195135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}