Quebec firms warn against lockdown
MONTREAL• Quebec’ s manufacturing and construction associations say there will be major damage to Quebec’s economy if the government imposes a strict COVID-19 lockdown similar to what occurred last spring.
Véronique Proulx, CEO of Manufacturiers et Exportateurs du Québec, reacted Tuesday to multiple media reports saying Premier François Legault is set to close non- essential manufacturing businesses to help stop the spread of COVID-19.
“The worst scenario for us would be to go back to the same situation we had last spring,” Proulx said in an interview. She said Quebec manufacturers lost $ 4 billion in sales when they were shut during the first wave of the pandemic and said she expects a similar situation if manufacturers are forced to close again.
Legault is scheduled to hold a news conference Wednesday evening and is meeting with opposition leaders Tuesday. According to multiple reports, the province may, for the first time since the spring, order “non-essential” manufacturers to close along with the construction sector and schools.
If Quebec is the only jurisdiction in North America that orders factories to close, Proulx said, it will put the province’s manufacturing industry — which employs 450,000 people and accounts for 14 per cent of Quebec’s GDP — at a severe disadvantage.
“If we’re shutting down and consumers continue to buy, as they did during the last shutdown, they’ ll be buying from Amazon and they’ll be buying from other manufacturers who can actually continue to produce,” she said.
“The market share that these foreign companies are gaining is there to stay; it’s very difficult for Quebec manufacturers to win them back.”
Proulx said manufacturers have put measures in place to prevent the transmission of COVID-19, adding that while there may be room for stricter rules in some parts of the industry, she said hasn’t seen the data that supports shutting down the whole sector.
“Why do we want to shut down manufacturing now? What numbers are supporting this?” she said.
About 27 per cent of active COVID-19 outbreaks in Quebec workplaces were identified in the manufacturing industry during the week ending Dec. 19, according to the most recent government data. Those outbreaks were tied to 1,336 infections.
Retail stores accounted for about 22 per cent of workplace outbreaks during the same period, while the construction sector was responsible for about nine per cent.
Guillaume Houle, spokesman the Association de la construction du Quebec, said Tuesday his organization wants the government to keep construction sites open.
He said the small number of outbreaks in his industry — which employs about half a million people in Quebec — suggests the measures currently in place are working. Houle, however, said the industry is open to having new discussions with health officials and unions about stricter measures that would allow sites to stay open.
With construction contributing around $ 1 billion to Quebec’s GDP every week, Houle said the economic cost of another shutdown would be “unprecedented.”
But Eric Boisjoly, director general of the construction wing of one of Quebec’s main labour federations, said measures to stop the spread of COVID-19 on work sites aren’t being enforced as much as they were when the industry reopened in the spring. He said the problem is more acute on smaller sites.