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I will always remember the moment when Justin Trudeau lost my confidence in him. He had won the election and was saying all the right things and everything looked okay. An then he called off his promise to institute Proportional Representation. It had been a key point in his campaign, and the main reason I supported him. And then he didn’t need it anymore, so he dropped it. That was the beginning of a long, slow slide.
And now I’m getting to a similar point with Mark Carney, and it has to do with a bridge.
Laying the Blame
It all started in 2012, when Conservative Stephen Harper was Prime Minister and Dalton McGinty was winding down as Liberal Premier of Ontario. The contract was signed, and shovels went into the ground in 2018.
Fast forward to 2026. Governing parties have switched, with Liberal Mark Carney in charge in Ottawa and Conservative Doug Ford running Ontario. And chaos reigning south of the border.
The Original Terms.
My impression of the contract was that Canada would pay for the bridge. Once it was open, Canada would collect the revenue until the price was paid. From then on, the two countries would share the profits 50/50. Canada obviously wanted the bridge more, so took the original risk, but it all evened out in the end.
The Fix
Enter the bent president whose greed for himself and his henchmen outweighs all other considerations. He wants a better deal. He suggests profit sharing from the start. Negotiations ensue. The key snag seems to be “servicing the debt.” It’s a minor matter that Canada borrowed $6.4 billion to complete the project. When do we get our money back?
The Announcement
Carney announces a new deal, in which sharing of the net profit starts right away and somehow (I’m not sure how) Canada gets the debt serviced.
The Denial
US says there is no debt servicing in the deal.
And it seems this is the case. Unless Carney can, by some twist of financial magic, make “servicing the debt” part of the overhead that comes off before the net earnings are calculated, there’s a $6.4-billion-plus-interest loan that needs to be paid off.
It’s definitely not covered in the “Operating Costs” section of the contract, which specifically lists cost of maintenance, staffing, and snow removal.
Two Questions
First, how could anyone spend six billion dollars on a project and not have a reasonable contract? The only possible answer is that was then and this is now, and with Mr. Greed Personified in charge, no contract is worth anything.
Second, and more important to me, why did Carney say the debt servicing was included when it wasn’t? He’s the financial wizard. He didn’t make a mistake.
The Bottom Line
If Carney made the statement and the statement was false, in Canada we call that a lie. The Canadian electorate needs reassurance, and we need it now. Up until this point we have trusted Carney without much evidence either way, but he has created a great credibility gap.
I’m going to be monitoring messages from the Prime Minister’s Office very closely for the next week or so.
In the Future
There are a lot of bad deals going down these days, and I figure a lot of countries are playing for time. They are assuming that Trump and his Republican supporters will fall out of favour, hopefully in the November mid-terms, and at worst in 2028.
Once Trump is gone, there is going to be a rush of people, both inside the US and outside, demanding re-negotiation of these deals, and the Gordie Howe Bridge will be near the top of Canada’s agenda.
But then we will be dealing with Democrats, who have a history of being less interested in doing business and more concerned with the welfare of their citizens. There will be a lot of deals that the Democrats will be happy to blame on Trump but do nothing to change.
This doesn’t sound like a good deal, no matter how you slant it.