QUEEN’S PARK – Politics – Gilles Bisson the MPP for Timmins-James Bay stood in the Ontario Legislature to make a statement on the Ring of Fire. 

Gilles Bisson –  Where have you been for the last three or four years?

We’ve listened to this government now in three budgets—probably three or four—and at least two throne speeches talk about the wonderful opportunity that presents itself in the Ring of Fire in northern Ontario. We have some of the best mineralogical ability in that part of the province when it comes to chromite, when it comes to nickel, when it comes to other metals. 

We’re looking at this government and saying, ‘Where have you been for the last three or four years?’ There is an opportunity here to position Ontario as a stainless steel producer. You need chromite, you need nickel and you need iron ore, all things that belong here in Ontario, and if all we’re trying to do is to create a mine up in the Ring of Fire, I think we’re selling Ontario short. We should be trying to position this as a stainless steel play for the province of Ontario. 

Imagine if we can mine the minerals that exist in the Ring of Fire, that we can ship them to facilities here in Ontario that not only transform them to chromite, but bring them from chromite all the way to stainless steel, we have an opportunity to create, in this province, an economic powerhouse that will be able to help this province for years to come. This is not an industry that will be there for five or 10 years. It’s an industry that will be there for 100 years. 

I look at this government and I say to myself where have they been? It seems to me they’re trying to downplay the potential of the Ring of Fire. So I say to this government, we should really be looking at positioning this as the Ring of Fire is moving into production. We should be looking at how we position this so that we can be in the stainless steel business here in Ontario.