Apuiat wind farm ‘critical,’ couillard says
GASPÉ/MATANE/SEPT-ÎLES The Apuiat wind farm is “critical” and should go ahead — even if there is a net cost for Hydro- Québec, Liberal Leader Philippe Couillard said on Tuesday.
The 200-megawatt project on Quebec’s North Shore is being developed thorough a partnership among three Innu communities and Boralex, a private company.
However, a leaked letter from Hydro-Québec president Eric Martel suggested the project could cost the utility between $1.5 billion and $2 billion over 25 years.
“How do you define profit? Profit is the peaceful development of Northern Quebec with First Nations,” Couillard said on Tuesday afternoon, after meeting with Innu leaders. “We have a strategic choice to make here. On one hand, we can try to develop projects in constant opposition with First Nations, and conflict, and there will
How do you define profit? Profit is the peaceful development of Northern Quebec with First Nations.
be no projects. Or we can use this opportunity to make them true partners in projects.”
Couillard said the cost estimates in the leaked letter need to be revisited.
“I don’t necessarily agree with these numbers but, again, how much will it cost us not to do it?” Couillard asked.
However, the Coalition Avenir Québec is opposed to the project. It has said there’s no market for the electricity and the cost is too high.
Parti Québécois Leader JeanFrançois Lisée has said he supports the project in principle, but believes the public should have all the details about the cost before the election.
But, for Couillard, it’s not just about money.
“The choice is very simple, permanent conflict or peaceful and harmonious development,” he said.
But while the CAQ says its opposition to the project is partially because there’s no need for the electricity, on Tuesday, Legault said the province should continue to develop hydroelectric power and, if more electricity can be sold to the United States, it should build more dams.
Earlier in the day, during a visit to Gaspé, Couillard promised that if his party is re-elected on Oct. 1, it would move bureaucrats and managers — up to the level of assistant deputy minister — who make decisions about natural resources to the region where the majority of economic activity related to that resource is located.
“There is a fundamental difference, a huge difference, in the way people, like me, living in a region, see Quebec,” Couillard said, who lives in Saguenay–Lac- Saint-Jean. “Always seeing resources taken out of the region and decisions made elsewhere.”
Employees who deal with mines at the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources would move to Abitibi-Témiscamingue; workers who deal with the forestry sector at the Ministry of Forests, Wildlife and Parks would move to Saguenay—Lac-St-Jean; workers who deal with fisheries at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food would move to Gaspésie; while workers who deal with mariculture (aquaculture practised in the open ocean), also at the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, would move to the Îles-dela-Madeleine.
Living in the regions, instead of Quebec City, would change the way workers approach issues, Couillard said.
In Gaspé, the local mayor agrees. When a deputy minister or the director of a program buys his groceries at “the same place as the people working in the fisheries, we know that he’ll be more aware of the reality in the area,” said Daniel Côté, the mayor of Gaspé.
“To make the best possible decisions to respond to real needs, you have to be as close as possible to where the decisions will have an impact.”
Decentralization is extremely important for the region, Côté said, people in Quebec and Montreal don’t always understand the reality of more rural areas.
“Regardless of the results of the election,” he said. “I hope this will be carried out.”
The Parti Québécois has promised to devolve more power to regional governments and allow them to act with more independence from the provincial government. It has also promised to engage in local consultations as it plans its regional investment projects in health, transport and education.
While the federally defined economic region around Gaspé, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, has the highest unemployment rate in the province, even here, local politicians talk about a shortage of workers.
“In the city we have full employment,” Côté said.
“In the summer we have more than full employment. There’s an enormous shortage of workers in the summer.”