OTTAWA — NDP Leader Avi Lewis says his party would campaign to return Canada’s largest airports to public control if Prime Minister Mark Carney succeeds in turning their operations over to private investors.Lewis made the commitment after the Western Standard asked whether the NDP would accept a compromise from the majority Liberal government or seek to reverse the policy in a future election..“We want to stop the privatization,” Lewis said Tuesday. “The alternative to airport privatization is not a half-measure.”Carney announced last week that Ottawa would seek private investment through long-term concessions to operate Canada’s four largest airports: Toronto Pearson, Montréal-Trudeau, Vancouver and Calgary.The federal government would retain ownership of the underlying land and assets, while private concession holders could assume responsibility for airport operations.Ottawa expects the concessions to raise tens of billions of dollars, which Carney said would be reinvested in regional airports, local transportation projects and other infrastructure..Lewis rejected the distinction between selling the assets and granting private companies long-term operating rights.“The alternative is not to proceed with this completely unnecessary and costly and, frankly, dangerous plan,” he said.Lewis pointed to the number of employees and travellers who could be affected by the change.“The folks here who work at airports — I mean, think about Pearson Airport. There’s 52,000 employees there,” he said.“There’s an enormous number of Canadians who work in our major airports and in the industries around them and support systems around them. And there are, of course, millions of Canadians who rely on air travel in this enormous country.”Lewis said the NDP is attempting to mobilize airport workers and passengers against the proposal before the government establishes the concessions.“We are building a movement from coast to coast to coast to say, ‘Don’t do it,’” he said.“You’re hearing it from the workers, and you’re going to hear it more and more from travellers.”When the Western Standard asked directly whether the NDP would campaign to restore public control if the Liberal plan nevertheless went ahead, Lewis replied: “We’re going to, of course.”“But the goal right now is to stop this from happening,” he added.Carney has argued that private capital and operating expertise would improve airport service while unlocking the value of the assets without selling them.“Following best practice in other countries, the Government of Canada will retain ownership of the underlying land and assets, but we will unlock their true value by bringing in new capital and expertise into their operations and growth,” Carney said when announcing the plan. The government has not yet disclosed the proposed length or financial terms of the concessions.
