SURPRISE WIN FOR BOMBARDIER
U.S. trade body rules in its favour
The decision by the U.S. International Trade Commission to overturn duties of nearly 300 per cent on imports of Bombardier C Series planes was greeted with surprise and joy in Montreal.
“It’s great news, it threw me off my chair, to be honest,” said David Chartrand, the Quebec coordinator of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which represents 6,000 workers at Bombardier plants in the Montreal area.
“With the cultural context that’s prevailing in the United States right now, with the protectionism and the Trump administration that’s in place, I was convinced, and a lot of people were also convinced, that they’d support the decision and go forward with the Boeing complaint. The fact that it was overturned not by two, not by three but by four unanimously, we’re just ecstatic, we’re happy, we couldn’t have asked for a better result.”
Still, he said, workers will be holding their breath as they wait to see if Boeing appeals the decision.
In the meantime, though, “it’s a lot of weight off our shoulders,” Chartrand said. If the duties had been maintained, he said, it could have closed the U.S. market to the C Series, potentially putting the whole program in jeopardy, “which could result in thousands of job losses here in the Montreal area, Mirabel, Dorval, St-Laurent.”
Olivier Marcil, Bombardier’s vice-president of external relations said the company was always confident in its case.
“This was really an attack on Bombardier under the pretext that the sale to Delta caused harm to Boeing, but Boeing didn’t compete for the sale to Delta … so it was difficult for them to prove that they suffered harm when they weren’t even on the starting line,” he said.
“We always believed that we had a great case, that the facts were on our side and we’re glad to see that the USITC commissioners saw through Boeing’s games.”
Marcil thanked both the Canadian and Quebec governments for their support in the dispute as well as Bombardier workers.
Under a deal with Airbus, which sees the European aircraft maker take a majority stake in the C Series program, C Series planes destined for the U.S. market will be assembled in Alabama. While Marcil said he didn’t know whether that swayed the USITC, as the final decision has not yet been released, he said the Airbus deal was still the right thing to do.
“We always believed that the C Series, in order to reach its full potential, would need a very strategic partner and we do have a strategic partner in Airbus,” he said. “It was the right decision, and it’s still the right decision, we’re going to continue full steam with this.”
Karl Moore, a business professor at McGill University, said he thinks the plan to build C Series planes in the U.S. probably did play a role.
“I think that’s a central part of why it’s a four-zero decision,” he said. “The plane’s going to be assembled in Alabama for the U.S. market, therefore it’s creating American jobs,” he said.
Moore said he also didn’t expect the decision.
“I’m genuinely surprised that Bombardier won,” he said. “It’s America at its best. I really think it’s a fine and appropriate decision, economically.”
While the decision runs counter to the rhetoric of the Trump administration, he said, the USITC is not supposed to be a political body.
“It is supposed to be an independent tribunal that looks at the facts and that’s what I would argue they’ve done,” he said.
For Bombardier, and Airbus, Moore said he thinks this means they’ll sell a lot of C Series planes in the U.S. “It means the world’s largest market for the C Series is wide open, where if it had gone the other way, it would have shut it down,” he said.
The Conseil du patronat du Québec hailed the decision as a victory for international trade.
“In these difficult times for international trade negotiations, this decision acts as a balm for international relations, as well as for the entire Canadian and Québécois aerospace industry,” Yves-Thomas Dorval, the president and CEO of the employer’s group said in a statement. “It the entirety of the ecosystem of suppliers who participate in the supply chain around the construction of plans, both in Canada and the United States, who will benefit from this decision.”