OTTAWA - Stephen Harper’s government could come under new pressure to come up with cash for new sports facilities in the rest of Canada after a group of his Quebec City MPs appeared to signal that Ottawa will get behind a plan to bring the Quebec Nordiques back to that province’s capital.
In Saskatoon on Thursday, Harper said his government was prepared to consider some kinds of help for cities and provinces but wouldn't cut a cheque directly to sports teams.
“In terms of financing any of these things going forward, we're going to have to respect the precedents we had in the past and be sure any treatment we're prepared to give to one major city we're prepared to give to all,” Harper said. “I’m a big sports fan, a big fan of teams in the National Hockey League and the Canadian Football League, and we understand that these are very important to our large communities across the country. We want to see these operations, which are important to people, thrive. That said, these are professional business operations. The government does not [and] has never directly financed professional sports clubs.”
The Nordiques moved out of Quebec City in 1995 to become the Colorado Avalanche, but provincial, municipal and business interests have been pushing to bring an NHL team back to that city.
The first step in bringing back the Nordiques is building a new arena, a project that comes with a $400-million price tag.
This week, after Quebec Premier Jean Charest said his government would cover about 43% of that bill, a group of federal Conservative MPs from Quebec made the front page of Quebec City newspapers wearing Nordiques jerseys and and giving the thumbs up.
That photo op has been widely interpreted in communities elsewhere in Canada that are also seeking federal funds that the federal government is ready to deal on new arenas and football stadiums.
“If Quebec gets money, we better damn well get money too,” said a political policy adviser working on the project in Regina, where the federal government is being pressured to come up with millions to help build a new multi-purpose facility that would include a new home for the CFL’s Saskatchewan Roughriders.
Funding for that facility was believed to be among the topics Harper discussed in private meetings Thursday with Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall.
In Edmonton, the municipal council is putting together plans to build a new arena for the NHL’s Edmonton Oilers. The price tag for that project is about $450 million, and while the Oilers’ ownership will invest about $100 million, a council committee concluded that “it is highly probable that (this) will require contributions from all orders of government in order for it to be economically viable.”
Sources close to the discussion in Edmonton say any federal or provincial funding will not be for the arena itself, but could be for the surrounding infrastructure that supports such a project.
Meanwhile, in Hamilton, Ont., the federal government has already committed to help pay for a stadium to host the 2015 Pan Am Games.
But the federal commitment is only paying for a stadium that would hold between 15,000 and 20,000 fans. If it was to become the home of the CFL’s Hamilton Tiger-Cats -- as the Ticats ownership wants -- it would need to hold about 30,000 and would cost many millions more.
So far, details of the federal commitment to that project have yet to be worked out.
