In some ways it must be nice to be a politician. In what other field can you consistently lose vast sums of money without it denting your prestige or your self-esteem? Sure, you occasionally get a small news item saying “GM Canada said Friday it was temporarily halting production and cutting staff at its CAMI plant in Ingersoll, Ont., because of lower-than-expected demand for its electric delivery vehicles.” But then you can rush in with lavish promises to clean up a mess you don’t mention having caused, save jobs, offload the lemons or do some other unspecified thing that will make economic disaster a plus. And nobody buttonholes you to say “Why did you dump tens of billions of tax dollars into this industry claiming you knew it was a sure-fire winner and it folded like a cheap lawn chair six months later?” Well OK. We did. But does Ontario premier Doug Ford care, or retired-with-lavish-pension Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau? Or the new guy? Nice work if you can get it.
The announcement was smothered in consultant-speak:
“CAMI is making operational and employment adjustments to balance inventory and align production schedules with current demand”.
I.e. we made a lot of junk we can’t sell. Well, you have to keep those subsidies coming:
“The company remains committed to the future of the Brightdrop delivery van and the CAMI plant, and will support workers through the transition, she said.”
Transition. From what, one subsidy to another. As the National Post story noted:
“The production halt comes after U.S. President Donald Trump imposed 25 per cent tariffs on vehicles produced in Canada, but Wright said the CAMI adjustment is directly related to demand for the Brightdrop vehicle.”
Demand here being a word for lack of demand. So the plant will sputter then shut until October. As the state broadcaster’s story conceded:
“Two models of the BrightDrop Zevo are made on site and sales have lagged behind the competition, with numbers released by GM showing a total of 427 vehicles sold in Canada in 2024 and 1,529 in the United States.”
Which prompted a local union guy to make the entirely dispassionate claim that:
“Global demand for last-mile delivery vehicles is only growing. Our members have the skill, the experience and the pride to build world-class electric vehicles right here in Canada – all we need is the opportunity to keep doing it.”
Well, that and customers. Or gullible politicians. Who on this file seem to be more readily available.
Also gullible journalists. Because not one of these variants on a core Canadian Press story, including the version in the Globe & Mail, mentioned the small detail that, as Electric Autonomy had gushed three years ago:
“The Ontario and federal governments disclosed today that they are putting $518 million in public funds towards General Motors of Canada’s ongoing $2.3-billion dollar investment in upgrading its Ontario facilities. The province will supply $259 million in grants with the federal government pledging to match the contribution. In 2020, GM announced it was putting $1.3 billion into its Oshawa plant to bring vehicle production back to the city; then, in 2021, GM pledged $1 billion to its CAMI plant in Ingersoll plant to refurbish the facility to produce EVs. GM previously announced it will be starting production on its BrightDrop electric delivery vans later this year in Ingersoll.”
Kachingggg! Kaboom! Kachingggg! Kaboom! And on it goes.
Indeed, as we mentioned in March about another collapsed Canadian-government EV subsidy, the looming bankruptcy of Sweden’s Northvolt after Ottawa dumped a big pile of money into its battery plant in of all places Quebec, then-Industry minister François-Philippe Champagne babbled “What’s important is we managed to get Québec into the automobile industry.” Exactly as if the investment had prospered not collapsed.
Worse, he preened “You’re going from a technology that we’ve been doing for 100 years and now we’re looking at the next 100 years.” Having failed to foresee next 10 months. So where is he now?
Why, promoted to… aaaack, what? Finance Minister. So he can set far bigger piles of cash ablaze without being held to account.
In the deranged dominion where Orwellian newspeak is the third official language, subsidizing boondoggles is considered competitive advantage and applies to the green blob as well as the legacy media. Carney will take it to a new "high".