The Ford government says it is “looking at” buying Highway 407 as part of its attempts to reduce gridlock but won’t offer any details of what that consideration looks like and if any work has taken place behind the scenes to advance the idea.
Ontario Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria was asked repeatedly on Thursday about plans Premier Doug Ford had previously indicated were underway to bring Highway 407 back into public ownership at a potential cost of $35 billion.
“Everything is a part of the process — we will continue to look at every option, whether that be the 407, whether that be continuing to build in this province,” Sarkaria said.
The minister, however, repeatedly refused to offer details of what actions — if any — the government had taken to pursue the plan.
Asked if the province had contacted the owners of the 407 to discuss buying it, engaged consultants to evaluate the cost or taken any concrete new steps in the plan since Ford announced it, Sarkaria pivoted to talk about highways in general.
“Like we do with all of our projects, we undertake and look at options across the sector to see how we can move forward,” he said.
Over roughly five minutes, Sarkaria was asked seven different ways by reporters what work was being done to evaluate a potential Highway 407 buyback; he didn’t say.
“We have to build for the future,” he said, in response to a question asking if it was financially wise to try and purchase the route for tens of billions of dollars.
While the government won’t say what work, if any, has taken place to look at taking control of Highway 407 — or reducing tolls for it — Ontario Liberal MPP John Fraser said the province should have the resources to handle the study in-house.
“You obviously have to talk to financial people about how you can do this,” he said.
“Government’s perfectly capable of doing this, finding the resources and you don’t necessarily need a ton of resources to do it, it doesn’t have to be an intensive project.”
The questions came after the Ontario NDP filed a freedom of information request looking at what work the government had done to study the buyback. That request yielded no records, although a variety of factors including the search terms used or timeline could contribute to the lack of records.
NDP Leader Marit Stiles accused Ford of “misleading” people when he said his government was looking at buying back the tolled highway.
“This is what we get from the premier and from this government time and time again — a lot of rhetoric, a lot of nice words, but they’re not actually taking action,” she said.
“I’ll believe it when I see — because again, there’s no evidence they’re even considering it.”
Highway 407 has become a central issue in Ontario politics and transportation, as the Ford government has embarked on an ambitious highway construction plan.
The Progressive Conservatives ran their 2022 election campaign under the promise of building Highway 413 and the Bradford Bypass, with opposition parties unanimously promising to cancel the former.
Recently, Premier Ford also announced he hoped to tunnel a fresh expressway under Highway 401.
Opposition parties, however, have pointed repeatedly to low traffic on Highway 407, which was sold by the government to a private operator.
The NDP has particularly championed the idea of negotiating a deal for truckers to use Highway 407, suggesting by removing them from Highway 401, gridlock would improve.
“I’ll remind you, we have put forward something they could do right now, a solution that would help a lot of people — just to remove the tolls on the 407 for truckers,” Stiles said.