— Who will be in the room: Brampton Mayor PATRICK BROWN, Ontario Solicitor General MICHAEL KERZNER, Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) President ERIN O'GORMAN, Montreal Port Authority interim CEO GENEVIÈVE DESCHAMPS and representatives from automakers Toyota and Honda.
— Speaking of something: On the eve before the summit, the federal government announced C$28 million for the CBSA to detect and search containers at ports to address stolen car exports. — Context: An Équite Association report released this week identifies Ontario and Quebec as the two provinces that both lead the country in passenger vehicle thefts with the lowest recovery rates. That trend, the organization said, suggests cars are primarily being exported or are selling stolen vehicles to unsuspecting buyers. — Trending: Liberals use summits as a go-to exercise to convene government and department officials and industry — a high-level event before bureaucrats take over. There have been at least nine in the past five years to address topics from gun and gang violence to Islamophobia and antisemitism. — Case study: There’s a formula for how these things usually unfold. Let’s look at the government’s national supply chain summit as an example. The Covid-19 pandemic created bottlenecks that exacerbated a global supply chain crisis. In Canada, the problem went from bad to worse after extreme weather in British Columbia damaged roads and railways in late 2021, gumming transport logistics carrying goods east. In response, former Transport Minister OMAR ALGHABRA called a national supply chain summit for Jan. 31, 2022. Then, two weeks after the summit, the government struck a supply chain task force “to help provide additional advice” — non-binding, of course — to the minister. Follow-up meetings were arranged, but it wasn’t until August that the government released its “What we heard report,” essentially meeting minutes and a next-steps chart. A final 56-page report was released on Oct. 6, more than eight months after the summit. — ISO national action plan: Craig Stewart, the Insurance Bureau of Canada’s vice-president of climate change and federal issues, says the summit sends a clear message that auto theft is a “costly national epidemic” and public priority. — The deliverables: Ottawa has committed to developing a national action plan on auto theft, expected to be made public in “the weeks ahead,” Stewart tells Playbook. The IBC will be a party at today’s summit. They want to see Ottawa commit new budget support for the CBSA to improve controls at port and borders. “Requiring that all vehicles destined for permanent export be available for inspection 72 hours prior to departure would harmonize our standard with U.S. Customs and Border Protection,” he says. The IBC has been calling for a national task force on stolen vehicles since November 2023.
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