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The deal will see the firm provide in-service support for an initial service period of eight years, with options to extend services up to 35 years. The company will be given significant access to Department of National Defence facilities and support equipment, as well as, in some cases, oversight of federal workers.

Members of UNDE will gather for the protest outside CFB Esquimalt around noon on Thursday. Members are in Victoria, BC for the UNDE convention.

“We want to people to know this contract and other attempts to privatize services are going to cost taxpayers even more money,” said UNDE president John MacLennan. “And they will cost jobs.”

Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan, however, says the contract “doesn’t impact our public service employees at all.”

A Thales official said the company is “going to leverage the skills that exist.”

Earlier this year, leaders of 10 unions whose workers are involved in navy ship maintenance wrote Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan to ask that the contract be put on hold. That request was ignored.

In a June 23 letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau both UNDE and the Public Service Alliance of Canada warned about putting such a significant contract in the hands of private industry.

“As we have learned with expensive public contracts like Phoenix, mismanaged contacts can have significant adverse effects both on the department as well as the broader public service,” Robyn Benson, president of PSAC and MacLennan wrote to Trudeau. “Within DND, this is compounded by the potential compromising of our national security apparatus by private industry and clear security risks in under-investing in our own core capabilities.”