Someone posted here a few weeks ago that the government does not ‘do economic development’. He/she said that the private sector ‘creates jobs’.
Tee hee hee.
There’s a Globe story today about the $1 billion+ worth of regional industrial benefits flowing from the $3.4 billion Boeing contract with the federal government:
Boeing promised to send $400-million in contracts to the West, $200-million in Ontario, $320-million to Quebec, and the rest to be spent in the Maritimes or in more than one province at once. An official close to Boeing referred questions on the matter to the government, stating that “we are waiting for further direction from Industry Canada.”
Now, just exactly who (or whom) is deciding where the $ 1billion in aerospace funding will be spent?
“We are waiting for further direction from Industry Canada.”
Now on the heals of the billion dollar auto partnership for basically Ontario, the revised multibillion TPC program for basically Ontario and Quebec, the billion ship building contract for Nova Scotia and British Columbia. The billion dollar biofuels initiative for the Prairies – one might think that New Brunswick is due.
Fat chance. You’d have a better chance playing pickup sticks with your butt cheeks than New Brunswick getting anywhere near ‘its share’ of that gravy train.
One would hope that at least one New Brunswick company might get a little ‘offset’ dough. But don’t hold your breathe.
But, hey, maybe we’ll get some dough to build another nuclear reactor to power someone else’s economic development.