Stephen Harper Has Allowed 600 Canadian Companies to be Sold to Multinationals

Not happy with simply selling off Canada, Harper is also determined that others will follow suit.

In more than two decades, we lost 900. In just four years, Harper has released 600 companies from their commitment to our country. He's no doubt subsidizing most of them with our money.

One by one they’ve toppled: Stelco, Dofasco, Inco, Falconbridge, Noranda, Domtar. Since Stephen Harper took power, more than 600 Canadian companies have fallen into foreign hands.

... Community leaders say they have hollowed out Canada, stripping the nation of its industrial icons and destroying livelihoods. This week, the consequences of one of the biggest foreign takeovers of the Harper era are playing out in Sudbury. In 2006, Inco, which had provided five generations of miners with a middle-class income, was taken over by the Brazilian multinational Vale.

The new owner publicly promised not lay off any workers for three years. It also made explicit commitments to Ottawa’s investment review agency. They have never been revealed. Shortly before reaching the three-year mark, Vale announced it would lay off 423 Canadian workers; 261 in Sudbury and 162 at its other locations in Port Colborne and Voisey’s Bay. The next month, it said it was shutting the Sudbury mine for eight weeks, beginning June 1, 2009.

... Is Vale meeting its undertakings to the government? It’s hard to tell since Ottawa insists on keeping them confidential. Should Canadians ask whether this is the future they want? Yes.