By Guy Bourgouin

Last Thursday, the Conservative government voted unanimously to defeat my bill, the Making Northern Ontario Highways Safer Act. Lives could have been saved by reducing the number of winter closures and accidents on highways 11 and 17, oftentimes caused below-par winter maintenance standards — but Conservative MPPs stood together to say no.

Filled with hills, treacherous corners and undivided two-lane sections, the 2,000 kilometres that Highways 11 and 17 cover are an economic hub for Ontario and a lifeline for the Northern communities. The Ministry of Transportation’s Northern Ontario Commercial Vehicle Travel Profile report says there are “54,000 truck trips per week along the Northern Ontario highway network,” accounting for “an estimated value of $1.24 billion.”

My bill would have amended the current legislation (the Public Transportation and Highway Improvement Act) by including a new section to set out a classification system for Ontario highways, which would have in turn classified all 400 series highways, the Queen Elizabeth Way and highways 11 and 17 as Class 1 highways. Class 1 highways are cleared more quickly, and more often. That’s what the Conservative MPPs said no to.

(Snow must be removed within eight hours after the end of a snowfall on the 400 series of highways and on the Queen Elizabeth Way. Snow must be removed on Class 2 highways, such as 11 and 17 within 16 hours).

My team and I spent countless hours listening to residents, and speaking to transport, safety and construction stakeholders, as well as municipal authorities. We dug through the Ministry of Transportation’s databases. The conclusion of all that was disheartening: people are afraid of driving back from work, truckers are retiring or not working during the winter, and families are skipping Christmas dinners because they feel unsafe – and rightly so. According to data collected from the Ontario Road Safety Annual Report, collision and fatality rates are three times higher in the Northern Ontario highway network than in southern roads.

Things really started to go downhill in 2009, when the former McGuinty government chose to enforce private, “performance-based” area maintenance contracts. In 2015, the Auditor General’s report on Winter Road Maintenance made clear what Ontarians already knew: “since 2009, winter roads have not been maintained as effectively as they were prior to this date.”

The Liberal privatization of winter road maintenance means our families are at greater risk because, for the private company with the contract, the less spent on snowplows, the more profit they pocket.

My bill would force those companies to step up, and keep Northern drivers safer. But during the debates, Conservative MPPs said that would cost “taxpayers a great deal of money without substantial benefits.”

Simply put, the Conservatives put a price on the lives of people that tragically die and get injured on our highways every winter.

The three Northern Ontario Conservative ministers thought it unimportant to attend the debates or vote. Vic Fedeli (Nipissing) and Greg Rickford (Kenora-Rainy River) chose Ford boosterism events over being in the house for this vote, and Ross Romano (Sault Ste. Marie) just didn’t show up.

Northern Ontario Highways need to be safer. As representatives, we have a moral responsibility to ensure that children, families and workers can travel without risking their lives at every turn. I intend to keep fighting for the changes this bill would have enacted.

Guy Bourgouin is the NDP MPP for Mushkegowuk-James Bay.