Olivia Chow, MP

G20: Olivia Chow asks Stockwell Day to compensate local businesses and residents

March 22, 2010

Ms. Olivia Chow (Trinity—Spadina, NDP): The G20 Summit is coming in June to the Metro Convention Centre, which is in the wonderful riding of Trinity—Spadina. The supplementary budget shows $179 million for policing and security costs. The City of Toronto is very worried. They have requested that the federal government post a bond to cover expenses for potential property damage that could occur during the G20, and for costs incurred by small businesses. The experience in London and Pittsburgh shows, with the results of protests during the world economic summits in those two cities hosted in 2009, there is a need to do so.

Very straightforward, are you going to leave the small businesses in Toronto waterfront high and dry or will you compensate them for the loss during the summit? Will you post a bond so that they are not worried about what is going to come up? Economically it is tough out there and they are worrying about economic hardship.

Hon. Stockwell Day: We’ll overlook that last…I think that was a rhetorical question.

 Ms. Olivia Chow: I didn’t even hear it.

Hon. Stockwell Day: He can address it to you later.

    Madam Chair, security costs are always an issue at international events. They certainly were at the Olympics. Costs were very high and they are when these events are hosted, either here or around the world. I understand already projected costs for the summer Olympics in the U.K., for instance, are somewhat north of €2 billion and probably going up and we believe the federal government has a responsibility in the sharing of those costs. We certainly took on that responsibility seriously with the Olympics.

The last time there was a meeting here, in Ottawa, for instance, with President Bush, the President of Mexico, and the Prime Minister, there were considerable costs even to the city of Ottawa, and the federal government shared the responsibility there. So on the specific, I’d have to say to my colleague that I’ll leave it to our Public Safety Minister to decide what the best approach to that is. Some kind of a bond issue or how it’s done.

The goal is going to be that there will be no damages, and to have security in place so that that would be the final result. That’s always the goal. It’s unfortunate in a society like Canada’s which is very open, where we encourage robust demonstration and robust public displays of either support or lack of support for any particular issue, that there always are people who abuse that and move to violence. That’s always disappointing. I think whatever cause they’re promoting, once they move into the area of violence, they lose sympathy they might have had. Members may have seen and noticed the first Saturday of the Olympics in Vancouver there was a group who masked their faces and were particularly intimidating and violent, and it was actually the crowd itself, many of whom were protesters, who pushed back against them.