The Ontario government likely paid $828 million to scrap natural gas-fired electricity plants in Oakville and Mississauga — not the $230 million former premier Dalton McGuinty insisted, an energy consultant says.

Testifying before a legislative committee probing the politically motivated cancellations in Liberal ridings prior to the 2011 election, Bruce Sharp said Oakville cost $638 million by his calculations, well above the $40 million claimed.

And he told MPPs the government spent $28 million more than needed on the $190 million cost of scrapping the Mississauga plant because it will be cheaper to deliver natural gas to its new location near Sarnia.

“We’re sitting here because of the siren call of political intervention,” Sharp, an engineer, said as the committee heard its first witness since Kathleen Wynne became premier and acknowledged the cancellations were “political decisions” in the face of strong community opposition.

Sharp’s cost estimate did not come as a surprise because he put the numbers out in an analysis months ago, but opposition parties tried to use his testimony to bludgeon the minority Liberal government.

“His numbers were not new but under oath he made it clear this government has to come clean,” New Democrat MPP and energy critic Peter Tabuns told reporters after almost two hours of testimony from Sharp.

With the government previously pegging the cost of scrapping the Oakville plant and moving it to the Napanee area at $40 million, Progressive Conservative MPP and energy critic Vic Fedeli said the figure is “fabricated and a mere fraction of the truth.”

Ontario Auditor General Jim McCarter is examining the costs of cancelling the plants, with his first of two reports expected next month.

Liberal MPP Bob Delaney tried to discredit Sharp’s testimony, saying they are based on “limited work on open-source data . . . he was taking a few figures and making extrapolations.”

In his testimony, Sharp said the 56,000 pages of documents released by the government and the Ontario Power Authority on the plant cancellations to date have been difficult to sift through.

“It’s a big barrier.”

Wynne has promised the committee access to all government and Liberal party documents on the cancellations, even though MPPs have already requested precise documents on costs. The committee must now decide which papers it wants.

Wynne maintained she wants to nail down the real cost of cancelling the plants.

“I am going to do everything in my power to make sure that happens,” she told reporters in York Region.

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The committee — where Wynne has offered to give testimony on her knowledge of the cancellations — resumes Tuesday.

With files from Richard J. Brennan

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