Documents show the newly-minted Trudeau government's massive $39-billion national shipbuilding procurement strategy is in need of repair, with costs for some projects soaring and others on the edge of being cancelled
Media reports say Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan and Public Services Minister Judy Foote were warned the government needed to institute a four-point "action plan" to get the program back on track.
They were told budgets set under the procurement strategy process were out of line and "did not adequately account for risks and uncertainty."
As a result, the government would have to "review costing for all NSPS projects and seek funding decisions where budgets are aligned with cost estimates."
That suggests the $39-billion program could either grow even larger, or parts of it could be cancelled.
Briefing materials given to Sajjan and Foote suggested the price for three coast guard science vessels to be built under the government program had ballooned from an estimated $244 million in 2009 to $687 million this year, an increase of 181%
That project was awarded to the Seaspan's Vancouver Shipyard. The briefing assigned no blame but suggested there were improvements the B.C.-based shipbuilder could make.
But several sources within industry and government circles suggest there is plenty of blame to be cast at the government's shipbuilding bureaucracy. They say the price assigned to the science vessel was always too low for the capability requested.
There was also a warning that another planned coast guard ship, the offshore oceanographic science vessel, would need to have its funding envelope increased, as would the multi-billion-dollar replacement program for Canada's frigates.
The frigate program, for example, is for up to 15 so-called Canadian surface combatants and has a rough budget of $26.2 billion. Those ships are to be built at the Irving Shipyards Inc. facility in Halifax.
