The Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce represents nearly 800 Member companies with over 20,000 employees in the Thunder Bay area.  This year’s provincial budget comes at a critical juncture as Ontario’s business community continues to grapple with economic uncertainty. Budget 2025 must address Ontario’s productivity gap by focusing on measures that not only support immediate growth but also lay the groundwork for sustainable long-term investments. This will require policies that generate economic efficiencies, reduce red tape, break down silos, and support innovation.  

Immigration to address labour shortages

Labour shortages are being felt across the province, but particularly in Northern and Rural areas where population growth is limited.  Northern Ontario specifically is experiencing a demographic shift and a population decline that is fueled by natural aging, low fertility rates, a rising life expectancy and an increase of out-migration. Population and migration trends to 2021 suggest that Northern Ontario needs 100,000 newcomers by 2041 in order to sustain current population levels and our labour needs.

The federal Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot Program (RNIP) has proven highly successful in attracting new people to Northern Ontario specifically, and to rural and northern Canada generally. Ontario should learn from and mirror this success through the allocation of Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program (OINP) spots for Northern and Rural Ontario communities.  We again urge the Provincial Government to ensure that the Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program addresses labour market challenges by allocating 3,000 nominee spots to Northern Ontario.

International Students

International students are vital contributors to our economy, working part-time jobs that help reduce labour shortages, contributing to the diversity and vitality of our communities, supporting the success of our post-secondary institutions, and reversing declining population trends in the North.

Recent federal changes to study permit policies, including the introduction of Provincial Attestation Letters (PALs), are of serious concern because they risk interrupting these vital contributions to Northern Ontario’s current and future success.  We support Lakehead University and Confederation College in their recommendations to ensure:

• Equitable Distribution of PALs: Allocate proportionally more PALs to Northern Ontario institutions to reflect their outsized role in training and retaining talent where it is needed most.
• Flexibility in PAL Allocations: Ensure allocations reflect enrollment profiles and allow institutions to meet the needs of both undergraduate and graduate programs.
• Alignment with RNIP: Provide PAL allocations that support RNIP goals, sustaining pathways for international graduates to stay and contribute to the region.

Financial Support for Post Secondary Institutions

As referenced above, federal changes to immigration approvals for International Students will be felt across our local and regional workforce.  An additional and equally concerning impact is the significant reduction in enrollment and associated revenues for our post-secondary institutions as a result of these policies.  Both Lakehead University and Confederation College have been extremely successful in attracting International Students to offset declining enrollment by domestic students.  A reduction in international student enrollments will be a significant financial burden that could result in a loss of programming and loss of jobs within our post-secondary institutions.  We urge the Provincial Government to support Lakehead University and Confederation College to ensure continuation of critical programming that is essential to workforce development across the region.

Taxes & Red Tape on Alcohol

We support the efforts of Ontario Craft Brewers to achieve a more competitive and lower tax environment for craft brewers in Ontario and join them in calling for a new beer tax structure that includes:

• Lower rates for small craft breweries to allow them to invest in building capacity and efficiency.
• Progressive tax brackets where tax rates increase proportionally as brewers grow their production volumes.
• Marginal tax rates similar to Federal Excise Tax where, for example all craft brewers pay the same rate on the first 1,000 hL of beer they produce.
• Consolidating multiple existing taxes into one simple overall beer tax.

Forestry

Forestry continues to be a major contributor to our economy providing direct and indirect employment to thousands of hardworking men and women in our region.  We support the implementation of Ontario’s Forest Strategy and the recommendations of the Ontario Forest Industries Association budget submission which calls for the Ontario Government to:

• work with federal colleagues to pursue a softwood lumber settlement that works in the best interests of Ontario lumber producers and advocate for a financial backstop;
• actively seek investment to restart idled softwood kraft lines in Ontario and Quebec to provide immediate relief for some sawmill producers;
• continue and expand the $10 million Sawmill Chip Program, ending March 25, 2025,
• expand in both length and volume current bilateral power purchase agreements (PPAs) with forest biomass-fired electrical generation facilities to provide communities, industry, and workers with a certain future; and,
• increase the Forest Access Roads Funding Program, which provides for the public use of Ontario’s forests to $75 million/year to reflect inflationary pressures and support legacy infrastructure upgrades (i.e., roads, bridges, and water crossings).

Procurement Processes

The Government is continuing to move forward to implement a centralized procurement model through the creation of Supply Ontario.  While we support efforts to improve the efficiency of procurement, we have concerns about the unintended consequences of further centralization to local communities.  Large provincial contracts cannot effectively be fulfilled by regional suppliers which could result in large contract awards being made only to national or multinational distributors, thereby damaging regional suppliers & economic development. 

As outlined in the recent Ontario Chamber of Commerce report “Power of the Purchase Order”, there are numerous steps the government can take to drive better outcomes, including:

• Adopting Value-Based Procurement across the public sector by defining objectives of procurement to include lifecycle costs, innovation, economic development and other long-term outcomes;
• Improving access to procurement for small and local businesses by centralizing information and reducing administrative barriers;
• Implementing regional procurement hubs;
• Establishing a supplier diversity policy; and,
• Working with the Government of Canada on its efforts to improve access to procurement for Indigenous businesses by leveraging partnerships.

Mining

Northwestern Ontario is home to hundreds of active mining projects representing Billions in mineral value and will have a significant impact on the economy of the Northwest and the Province as a whole.  The mining industry stimulates and supports economic growth both in large urban centres and in rural and Indigenous communities. 

Mineral deposits are often located hundreds or thousands of kilometres from road, rail, energy and technology infrastructure; as a result, companies are faced with costs of hundreds of millions of dollars in order to simply access their mining claims.  The costs to establish the required infrastructure are frequently too prohibitive for private-sector investment alone.  We welcome recent provincial investments that support infrastructure for regional mining development opportunities and urge continued assistance to ensure that needed infrastructure is in place.