BC Ferries will order overseas

BC Ferries in Canada claims domestic shipyards are not capable of building new vessels for its fleet. In a departure from past practice, the ferry company plans to award a contract worth $500 million to a shipyard in either Finland or Germany.

The newbuilding order will consist of two super ?C? class ships with an option for a third at $170 million each. BC Ferries? Vice President, Mark Stefanson, says it’s a matter of capacity. “The yards in Canada no longer have the capability to build the large vessels that we need.” That is why the corporation has asked the government in Ottawa to waive the 25% duty normally applied to foreign built ships.

Not surprisingly, the plan to build the new ferries overseas has angered the Canadian shipbuilding industry and George McPherson, of the Shipyard Workers Federation, says reports that they couldn’t match the European’s prices are wrong. The last big ferries built for BC Ferries were constructed in British Columbia in the early ’90s. A local bid by the Washington Marine group did make it to the first phase, with qualifications. The bid didn’t go beyond that.