BC Ferries is taking heat from port and starboard over its selection of a Chinese shipyard to build its next four major vessels.
The ferry service opened bidding for its major vessel replacement project to pre-qualified shipyards last September, and on Tuesday announced it had chosen China Merchants Industry Weihai Shipyards (CMI Weihai) following a due diligence process.
That decision has landed in the choppy waters of a global trade war and a surging “buy Canadian” movement that was not on the radar last fall.
B.C. Transportation Minister Mike Farnworth said Wednesday that while BC Ferries is an independent organization that makes its own commercial decisions, he was “disappointed (in) the fact that there is not more Canadian content” in the plan.
“Whenever contacts like this are awarded, I want to see as much Canadian and British Columbian content as possible.”
BC Ferries is a private company, not a Crown corporation. However, its sole shareholder is the B.C. government.
The issue has also drawn fire from the BC Conservatives, who have called for a review of the decision.
Leader John Rustad said the decision to source the ferries from China put the province’s economy and security at risk, given ongoing trade and tariff tensions with China.
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“Do we really want Canadian ships built in China?” Rustad said.
“Who knows what that relationship will look like a few years from now.”
In announcing CMI Weihai as the builder, BC Ferries cited its strong bid — including technical capabilities, experience and the “overall cost and value” it delivered.
Cost was also front and centre when BC Ferries announced the process.
“What we are not going to do is ask our customers to pay one dollar more than they need to simply because we are picking a local company,” BC Ferries executive director of communications Dave Groot told Global News in a Sept. 27 interview.
At the time, B.C.-based Seaspan shipyards said the bid process, which did not include incentives for B.C. or Canadian content, had essentially ruled it out of contention
The company acknowledged there was no question that building in B.C. would cost more, but said it would create major economic spinoffs, including income tax revenues from high-paying skilled jobs.
Seaspan, which handles highly complex and multi-billion-dollar contracts for the Coast Guard and Canadian Navy, says it is more than capable of delivering the new ferries.
“We acknowledge the need for BC Ferries to get some of these replacement vessels very fast given their aging fleet,” Seaspan senior vice-president and spokesperson Dave Hargreaves said in a Wednesday statement.
“We are hopeful that the B.C. government will work with our B.C. industry team to develop a strategy to build some of the seven vessels, particularly the last two, in B.C. in the future.”
Not all reviews of the choice have been bad, however.
Bruce Williams, CEO of the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce, said the Chinese contract is in the best interests of ferry-dependent communities, adding that BC Ferries did years of due diligence and that no Canadian companies entered bids.
“This is very timely, and it’s a good thing to have this happen,” Williams said, noting that there was an urgent need for greater ferry capacity.
At this point, I think it’s in the best interest of all the people, who rely on BC Ferries … especially up and down the coast in communities that are very reliant upon it.”
The list of pressure points between Canada and China is long.
China has imposed a variety of tariffs on Canadian goods, including seafood tariffs that have directly impacted B.C.’s fishing industry.
Canada has also raised concerns about the country’s human rights record and its support for Russia in the war with Ukraine.
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