North Bay City Council has made a formal request to transfer the ministry the ONTC falls under.

Right now, the Ministry of Energy Northern Development and Mines is responsible for Ontario Northland.

City Councillor Mac Bain who authored a motion calling the Premier to investigate transferring the ONTC to transportation says the move makes a lot of sense.

“You would think automatically that any transportation related industry would be under the guise of the Ministry of Transportation but it’s not. We’re hoping the premier and cabinet would agree to the transfer,” Bain says.

UNIFOR which represents ONTC workers has already written the premier calling for the change and made a presentation to that effect at council this week.

Union president Andy Mitchell says there have been a lot of changes to the business in recent years and the ministry the ONTC falls under should reflect the reality.

“What we got left is a transportation agency. We believe a transportation agency should be under the MTO. We’ve got synergies with Metrolinx which is part of the MTO,” Mitchell says.

(photo by station staff)

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