Downsview airport is a visible landmark in North York, but the property is frequently ignored by the federal government costing taxpayers and jobs. A picket at Downsview Airport at the Longview - Da Havilland aircraft parts manufacturing plant has been ongoing since June. They’ve been asking for fair wages, but more importantly transparency on the future of their jobs. An onsite aviation school was funded by the federal government for $150M, despite the government knowing about the sale at the time.
Since the sale of the airport by Bombardier in March 2019 to housing developers, workers have been inquiring about their employment future. Employees have been slowly laid off without transparency before the 1500 Bombardier workers and 700 Da Havilland workers started to strike. Most of them have held their post for over 25 years.
In August, Bombardier conceded to move their operations near Pearson Airport through GTAA and expanded to 3000 jobs. However, Da Havilland refused a similar deal with GTAA. Picket members suspect the plant may be moved to Longview headquarters in Calgary, splitting families.
The same government who regulates the Downsview land and the aviation industry, has the power to protect local jobs and demand operations move to Pearson, but instead let It go to court. The judge laid an injunction heavily restricting strikes to what, Unifor National President, says is “One of the worst injunctions I have seen.” Our premier had a brief appearance advocating to protect the workers, but it is not provincial jurisdiction. Promising jobs post-election country-wide, while letting local jobs slip away, demonstrates that our area is being neglected.
Neglect seems to be nothing new from the federal government who also was reviewing the sale of the airport when Centennial College Aviation campus opened onsite a mere 2 months before the sale of the airport. While reviewing the sale, $150M including a hangar, airplanes, helicopters, all requiring a runway, were granted or gifted to the facility the federal government knew would have a lifetime of less than the length to complete a bachelor’s program. This waste of taxpayer funding is unfortunately nothing new to this area.