$13 billion could save a lot of Canadian companies

The closure of Canfor’s Rustad sawmill is a tough, but not totally unexpected, pill to swallow for this community.
Although 205 direct jobs will be lost, many more will be lost in logging, trucking and other service and supply areas outside the mill.
The indefinite closure means workers have no idea if they should just go on EI and try to ride it out, go to school to upgrade their skills, retire early or start seeking another job immediately.
A fixed timeline to restart the mill – or a clear indication that the mill will be closed for a long time – would allow workers to make plans for their future with some certainty.
No one wants to sell their house in a down market, uproot their family and move to find another job, only to have their old job at the mill restart a week or month later.
But the reality is that Canfor doesn’t know if or when they’ll restart the mill.
Canfor communications director Dave Lefebvre’s comments earlier this week made it clear that the company is in triage mode. It’s hemorrhaging money quick, and needed to cauterize some of the worst wounds.
Major players like AbitibiBowater and Pope & Talbot have already fallen casualty to low prices, slow sales, unfair U.S. trade policy and a high Canadian dollar.
The U.S. home construction industry is a major purchaser of Canadian softwood lumber.
The U.S. Commerce Department reported that American new housing starts hit a record low in April at an annualized rate of 485,000 new homes – down more than 46 per cent over last year. It was the lowest annualized rate recorded since records began being collected in the 1950s.
The Forest Products Association of Canada estimates over 50,000 Canadian forest workers have lost their jobs in the last two years.
A loophole in U.S. law allows pulp mills to get tax credits for using alternative fuels by burning a mixture of black liquor – a byproduct of the pulp process – and diesel fuel. Canada, the European Union, Chile and Brazil have complained to the World Trade Organization – saying this could amount to an $8 billion subsidy to U.S. pulp producers.
Despite that, the Canadian government has not moved to bail out an industry which employs nearly a million Canadians.
Instead, Canadian taxpayers will pay an estimated $13 billion to bail out American automakers General Motors and Chrysler. These are American companies; let American taxpayers foot the bill if they want to.
Certainly General Motors and Chrysler directly and indirectly employ a lot of people in Southern Ontario, but there are healthy automakers who will fill the void.
Canadian tax dollars should instead be used to support Canadian companies who employ Canadian workers to harvest Canadian trees.
This can’t come in the form of a direct subsidy, because of the Canada-U.S. Softwood Lumber Agreement, but $13 billion will buy an awful lot of lumber.
Instead of subsidizing money-losing companies, why not spend the money to construct affordable, wood frame housing in cities across the country?
Habitat For Humanity could build an average of 72,200 to 86,600 affordable, accessible homes with $13 billion – boosting projected Canadian housing starts by 50 per cent.
Instead of funding golden parachutes for U.S. executives, that would generate local economic activity; create employment in construction, forestry, trades and retail; and help thousands of Canadian families struggling with high costs of living.