Shipping containers are seen at the Fairview Cove Container Terminal in in Halifax in 2017. Justin Trudeau’s government is considering committing public funds for the Melford International Terminal project just southeast of Port Hawkesbury, N.S., according to Transport Department officials.Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press
At least two federal Liberal MPS are expressing reservations about the prospect of a new deep-water container port in Nova Scotia, a break in party unity that could make it more tricky for the government to sell Canadians on the merits of the project should it move ahead with taxpayer money.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government is considering committing public funds for the long-talked-about Melford International Terminal project just southeast of Port Hawkesbury, N.S., according to Transport Department officials. Information obtained by The Globe and Mail suggests the government is evaluating a request for funds by the project’s private-sector promoter of about $175-million.
The Melford project, which includes a 315-acre container terminal and 1,500-acre logistics park located on the Strait of Canso, has been on the drawing board since about 2007, but has never taken off. News that the government is now weighing financial backing for the project appears to have caught even some Liberal MPs by surprise.
Two Atlantic members of Parliament have sharply criticized the venture in recent days. Like some leaders in the transportation industry, they question why it’s needed at a time Canada’s eastern ports are nowhere near capacity.
“It’s mind-boggling to think that we would entertain a third port in the region” in addition to Halifax and Saint John, said Wayne Long, a Liberal MP for the riding of Saint John-Rothesay. “I don’t know where one would deem this a good political move,” he told The Globe in an interview.
Andy Fillmore, a Liberal MP representing Halifax, is also voicing concerns about the prospect of public aid for the project.
“I worry an investment of this magnitude would only undermine previous investments the government has made in existing ports in our region,” Mr. Fillmore said in a tweet Sunday. “Before any decision is made, Canadians deserve to know what value Melford will provide that our other government-supported ports cannot.”
The developer of the port project is Melford International Terminal Inc., a group with directors and officers who include several Nova Scotia businessmen as well as Dan Bordessa, vice-chairman of Cyrus Capital Partners, a New York-based hedge fund, according to a corporate filing.
The group has pitched the project as a gateway to the northeast that offers shipping companies a “faster and better alternative for North American origin-destination containerized cargo.” It would boast ice-free, deep-water docking with no draft restrictions, specifically to accommodate the largest container ships.
The prospect of a major new privately controlled port threatens to shake up Canada’s established maritime system and its network of 17 major port authorities, which fall under federal control but set their own strategy and commercial direction. Speaking privately, some industry players say it doesn’t make sense for the federal government to provide financial backing to a facility operating outside the federal network.
Halifax, which stands to be most affected by Melford, can handle 1.2 million TEUs (20-foot equivalent units) a year, but only half of that is being used. The ports of Montreal and Saint John also have excess capacity, and all three ports have plans to add more container-handling volumes in the years ahead. In all, there is an estimated 1.3 million TEUs of excess container capacity at the moment at Canada’s major eastern ports.
“The federal government should not interfere in port business by subsidizing a new competitor,” said Kevin Piper, president of the Halifax chapter of the International Longshoremen’s Association, which represents dock workers in the port city. He said assertions by project supporters that Melford will serve large ships that Halifax can’t accommodate, which are circulating through the sector, are misleading. “There isn’t a container ship on the ocean today that the Halifax Port can’t serve.”
Nadine Ramadan, spokeswoman for Federal Transport Minister Omar Alghabra, said Monday the Melford funding application is still being reviewed. “We welcome the feedback from our local MPs and will continue to work collaboratively in the interest of Canadians,” she said via e-mail.
Richie Mann, a former cabinet minister in the Nova Scotia government in the 1990s, has been the face of the project as Melford International’s vice-president of government affairs and marketing. He has not returned numerous requests for comment from The Globe.