How Ottawa abandoned our only Arctic port
Canada’s only Arctic deep-water port is now closed, leaving workers in Churchill puzzled and any talk of Arctic sovereignty feeling like empty rhetoric
Scott Gilmore
August 18, 2016
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Despite Canada’s patriotic rhetoric about Arctic sovereignty, there is no Coast Guard here. No icebreakers. No Navy. No port police. The small RCMP detachment doesn’t have a boat. Omnitrax’s tugs are moored to their berth, idle. The harbourmaster only comes up when a freighter is expected. The Transport Canada building is padlocked and empty. There isn’t even a life ring to be found. It may be the only commercial deep-water port in the world without any security or rescue resources, and it’s been like this as long as anyone can remember.
If there’s an emergency in the bay, or in the surrounding wilderness, the people of Churchill are on their own. If a search and rescue aircraft is needed, it must fly in from Trenton, in southern Ontario, 2,000 km away.
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I asked if the Prime Minister has ever visited Churchill: No, not yet. The new premier of Manitoba, Brian Pallister, hasn’t either. But a senior Chinese diplomat was up last week to recruit locals interested in Mandarin language training. China is increasingly active in the Arctic; for them, the northern maritime route to Europe is about 6,000 km shorter. Beijing has yet to recognize Ottawa’s sovereignty over the Northwest Passage, which many believe will become increasingly important due to global warming and melting ice. Perhaps this is understandable. The Canadian North is the same size as the European Union but with a population of only 118,000 people—less than the city of Guelph, Ont.
Earlier this year Beijing published a shipping guidebook to Canada’s North, with detailed information on sea ice and weather, and announced it intends to transport cargo through the archipelago soon. China has refused to say whether it will ask Canada’s permission or not.
Either way, we have no choice in the matter. Canada no longer has an ocean-going blue water Navy after years of budget cuts, neglect and shipbuilding delays. The nearest naval base is in Halifax, 4,000 km to the south. And the Coast Guard has only seven icebreakers capable of truly northern operations. None are heavy enough to remain year round. And our force of part-time Canadian Rangers? They are still using Second World War era Lee-Enfield rifles.
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There’s a large inukshuk on a pebble beach behind City Hall where tourists stop for selfies. In recent decades the traditional Inuit landmark, and the North in general, has become a prominent part of our cultural identity. Canadians visit here to be more Canadian—to say they’ve stood on the tundra and photographed polar bears. Our politicians do the same thing, and they know how important the Arctic is to Canadian identity. They fly up, stand by some sled dogs, assure us Canada stretches from “sea to sea to sea,” and declare us an important northern nation.
But the town of Churchill proves these are just lies we tell ourselves. Canada remains huddled next to the U.S. border. Our northern ambitions were abandoned long ago. Now, we project our sovereignty and promote development with nothing more than empty rhetoric.
When Justin Trudeau took office last year he issued his ministers mandate letters containing over 360 different “priorities.” The Arctic was mentioned only twice. One of those, however, was to the minister of defence, commanding him to “renew Canada’s focus on surveillance and control of Canadian territory and approaches, particularly our Arctic regions.”
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The closure of this port, however, is not just a regional economic calamity, like a shuttered pulp and paper mill or under-capacity fish-processing plant.
At a time when climate change is opening up the Arctic Ocean to shipping, and powerful nations like Russia and China pose new threats to Canada's sovereignty, the viability of the only deepwater port connected to the nation's transportation network is no small matter. [...]
