QUEEN’S PARK – Tim Hudak, PC MPP for Niagara West-Glanbrook, and Peter Kormos, NDP MPP for Welland, teamed up in the Legislature today to call on the McGuinty government to finally take responsibility for closure of the CanGro plant in Niagara and assist the affected tender fruit farmers through this industry crisis.

Niagara MPPs Tim Hudak and Peter Kormos delivered a one-two punch to the McGuinty government Wednesday in the House, as both members criticized the government's handling of the CanGro closureHudak and Kormos delivered a one-two punch with back-to-back statements in the Legislature about the McGuinty government’s fruitless effort to negotiate the sale of the CanGro plant and its duty to assist the more than 150 tender fruit growers and 120 CanGro workers affected by the plant closure.

While the Minister of Economic Development and Trade was in China cutting a ribbon, they were handing out the pink slips at CanGro to 100 workers, and now 150 tender-fruit growers are without a market,” Hudak said in the Legislature today. “If you’ve already given up on CanGro in Niagara, then help the tender-fruit farmers and displaced workers find new jobs and new markets for our tender-fruit growers.”

“Peach and pear producers in Niagara wouldn’t need to change their crop if this government had come to the table meaningfully in support of maintaining CanGro,” Kormos added. “This government came to the table, but they didn’t bring anything with them.”

The hansard transcript of Hudak’s and Kormos’ statements is copied below for your information.

LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO
Wednesday, April 30, 2008

CANGRO PLANT CLOSURE

Mr. Tim Hudak: As you saw yesterday, I asked the Minister of Economic Development and Trade what offers the McGuinty government had put on the table to help save CanGro in Niagara, and sadly, there was no answer. Obviously, that meant that the province had put no offers on the table to save that plant.

Tender-fruit trees are being pulled out of the ground, as we speak. While the Minister of Economic Development and Trade was in China cutting a ribbon, they were handing out the pink slips at CanGro to 100 workers, and now 150 tender-fruit growers are without a market.

The McGuinty government gave $50 million to Magna, while their CEO, Mr. Stronach, was making $40 million. The McGuinty government gave $14 million to Sanofi Pasteur, a French multinational that has $4 billion in international sales. Yet they couldn’t find a single dime to save these jobs at CanGro in Niagara or support a bid by Niagara business people.

Dalton McGuinty locked this land into the greenbelt, and then he walked away. He is an absentee landlord.

I ask the minister, are you going to work to save this plant? And if you’ve already given up on CanGro in Niagara, then help the tender-fruit farmers and displaced workers find new jobs and new markets for our tender-fruit growers.

CANGRO PLANT CLOSURE

Mr. Peter Kormos: At the end of the day, the real issue is that the peach and pear producers in Niagara wouldn’t need to change their crop if this government had come to the table meaningfully in support of maintaining CanGro as the only fruit processing plant in Canada east of the Rocky Mountains. This government came to the table but they didn’t bring anything with them.

Minister Pupatello skedaddled off to China on the walking tour of the Great Wall while her bureaucrats sat silent and empty-handed at the so-called negotiating table, knowing full well that she was scuttling the deal by doing that.

There were two legitimate buyers of that operation: workers with a great deal of experience, and fruit producers who need a fruit processing plant. It is the last chance that this government has to save a made-in-Ontario value-added fruit processing plant.
For this government to somehow explain or complain that there was nothing they could do is beyond naive.

This government wants greenbelt? Greenbelt ain’t worth the paper it’s written on if you don’t have farmers earning enough working their property, producing peaches and pears to sustain that property as agricultural land.

This government talks about jobs? Well, it just turned its back on over 120 hard-working women and men down in Niagara at CanGro.

This government wants to see made-in-Ontario agricultural produce? Well, hell’s bells, what we’re going to be stuck with is imports from China. Maybe that’s what the minister was doing over there—arranging for those imports—because there ain’t going to be no fruit produce coming out of Niagara.