Town to award ‘bonus points’ in effort to buy local, Canadian

‘This is a great new policy supporting buy local, buy South Simcoe, buy Ontario, buy Canada. It’s what we need to do,’ says Bradford West Gwillimbury mayor

Bradford West Gwillimbury is doubling down on its efforts to support Canadian companies and workers.

Based on a report from from legal, risk management and procurement manager Vanessa Morum March 17, council sitting as committee of the whole endorsed a new purchasing criteria to help the town support local and buy Canadian as part of an objective to protect Canadian jobs.

“This is a great new policy supporting buy local, buy South Simcoe, buy Ontario, buy Canada. It’s what we need to do,” Mayor James Leduc said. “This gives the Canadian corporations a little extra bonus points.”

He explained that was the intent behind his own buy Canadian motion that council didn’t support Feb. 17.

The new criteria for competitive procurements would add 10 per cent to the scoring for any proposals meeting the requests that also have a place of business in Canada and have work completed by a workforce which is at least 70 per cent based in Canada.

That encourages use of Canadian workers, goods and services, without eliminating competition from non-Canadian suppliers, ensuring the policy doesn’t run afoul of trade commitments, such as the Canadian Free Trade Agreement (CFTA), according to the report.

Based on the CFTA, a public procurer can restrict tender to just Canadian suppliers, so long as it doesn’t conflict with international treaty obligations, and so long as the purpose isn’t to avoid competition or discriminate against other provinces.

While council has the authority to increase or decrease the 70-per-cent threshold, Morum warned that could risk non-compliance with the CFTA if the threshold is too high or too low. She acknowledged the perfect threshold for the town remains unknown and said staff will test and adjust the criteria as required.

“We won’t know until we try,” Morum said.

Still, some councillors had concerns, including Ward 4 Coun. Joseph Giordano, who worried about the impact on projects currently out for tender.

“I don’t like moving the goal posts,” he said.

Morum assured him the changes are forward looking and won’t have any retroactive impacts on projects already tendered.

Describing the town’s procurement costs as already being “exorbitantly high,” Ward 6 Coun. Nickolas Harper asked if using more Canadian labour, goods and services would further push up costs.

“Although I want to support Canadian in this economy, nothing really proves that anything is affordable to buy in Canada,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s even going to benefit the taxpayers.”

While her report acknowledges the financial impact of the policy remains uncertain, Morum assured council that all procurements are based on the approved budgets, and if any go over budget, they come back to council for consideration.

The changes come as a follow up to the town’s efforts from March last year to support Canadian products in light of U.S. tariffs. That was specifically for goods and services costing less than $133,800, or construction costing less than $334,400.

At the time, broader efforts were limited by gaps in the federal and provincial frameworks, plus staff needed to do further investigation into what could be considered a Canadian company.

Since then, the provincial government’s Buy Ontario Act received royal assent on Dec. 11, and mandates that provincial ministries, agencies and broader public sector organizations prioritize Ontario-made goods and services first, and Canadian second.

That furthered similar efforts from the Building Ontario Businesses Initiative Act from 2022, but neither were drafted to include the municipal sector.

“If the province or federal government is passing something, it should come down to municipalities too, so we can do the same thing,” committee chair and Deputy Mayor Raj Sandhu said.

Staff plan to continue monitoring updates from higher levels of government for further opportunities.

Meanwhile, procurement organizations have highlighted Canadian-based suppliers the town can use.

Still, there may be circumstances where domestic suppliers don’t offer the goods or services the town seeks, and as a result, the town may still need to purchase from non-Canadian suppliers.

Both Harper and Giordano voted against the new criteria, while Ward 1 Coun. Cheraldean Duhaney and Ward 2 Coun. Jonathan Scott were absent.

Recommendations from committee of the whole are considered for approval at the next regular council meeting.