Good news likely for GM within a week
By BILL CURRIE Standard Staff (St. Catharines Standard - February 24, 2005 - page A4)
The giveaways in Wednesday's federal budget won't affect handouts from a $1-billion automotive and aerospace manufacturing fund announced in June, says Citizenship and Immigration Minister Joe Volpe. Volpe said Wednesday the next share of that incentive will go to General Motors of Canada. Half the fund is earmarked for the auto sector over five years.
He declined to be specific, but said the funding would be announced within a week and would address productivity and investment issues in St. Catharines.
 "The first $100 million went to Ford in October. The second is being negotiated with GM," he said during a conference call to discuss the budget. "We have every intention of making sure that one of the fundamental components of southern Ontario and Canada is going to thrive."
Volpe would not say whether any of the investment would come to the two St. Catharines plants, only that Ottawa was finalizing negotiations with GM. "I think you'll find that we'll give you a very favourable answer to that question probably within the week," he said.
Ford used its $100 million to refurbish its Oakville plant. Renovations at the GM plant in Oshawa are also expected.
Volpe said the budget sets aside $42 billion ($2 billion a year over the next 10 years in Ontario) to address health care. "That's not an insignificant amount of money." One of the key problems for Niagara and many other communities involves the physician shortage. Volpe said the federal government has $75 million in a human health research fund to address the lack of doctors, nurses and pharmacists.
Foreign-trained doctors are unable to work in Ontario unless they worked at least two years in another province. Volpe said that's unfair, but regulatory bodies for physicians act autonomously under provincial legislation. The only thing Ottawa can do is provide money to study the problem and use the results to negotiate with colleges.
The feds also have $398 million more for immigrant services, which Volpe said will enhance language training and provide immigrants with the means to take a better look at the market in Canada.
| 
