NEWS
RELEASE
November 7, 2003
For Immediate
Release
YORKTON AIRPORT NEGLECTED BY LIBERALS
Ottawa
– Canadian Alliance MPs took the Liberal government to task for pouring $5.3
million dollars into a little-used airport in Charlevoix, Quebec, and ignoring
heavily used airports in the West. Yesterday, in the House of Commons,
Deborah Grey, MP for Edmonton North, asked: “Mr. Speaker, for corn's
sake, we have a little tourism out west ourselves. Red Deer is only one example
of western airports that have been virtually ignored by the government. Swift
Current, Tofino, North Battleford and Yorkton have received precious little
funding despite growing needs. Could
the government tell us why it is flying Charlevoix in first class and the west
in coach?” Martin Cauchon,
the Liberal Minister of Liberal Largess in Quebec defended the waste as a “fantastic
project.”
Mr.
John Reynolds, MP for West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast, continued the Alliance
attack:
“Mr. Speaker, Red Deer airport has local support for airport
improvements. It has provincial support. It even has $1 million committed by a
commercial airline carrier that wishes to start scheduled service.
In Red Deer, funding commitments have been made by the local and
municipal governments and private users. The
airport in Charlevoix serves cabinet ministers and the Desmarais family. When
other airports are willing to put up a third, a third, a third, how much money
did the Desmarais family contribute to airport improvements in Charlevoix?”
Garry
Breitkreuz, MP for Yorkton-Melville echoed the concerns raised by his Alliance
colleagues. “This whole thing
stinks.
This $5.3 million dollar so-called economic development project was for
the direct benefit of the Desmarais family and its $40 million dollar country
estate that is in the Charlevoix region. It’s
no accident that the estate is owned by Chretien’s son-in-law Andre Desmarais,
President of Power Corporation.”
Breitkreuz
continued, “It’s also no accident that the $5.3 million dollar grant was
handed out and defended by Justice Minister Martin Cauchon who once worked for
the Desmarais family at the estate during his student years and is still a ‘family
friend’ according to the newspaper reports. There is a real need for real
infrastructure improvements in our airports across Canada.
If there is money to spend, it should be spent where it will create the
most jobs, not where the Liberal government’s political friends have their
estates,” concluded Breitkreuz.
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