Presidents Cup | Quebec defends its subsidy

The Royal Montreal Golf Club welcomes the best golfers in the world this week for the Presidents Cup.

It will undoubtedly be an exceptional golf tournament.

But for taxpayers, this tournament will come at a price: $9 million. That’s the amount of government subsidies given to the PGA to bring the tournament to Montreal.

The Quebec government is paying 6.5 million. As for the federal government, it is paying 2.5 million, we learned The Press.

Over the past 15 years, only the Formula 1 Grand Prix has received more public money for a sporting event in Quebec, at an average of $18.7 million per year currently.

The Legault government used a decree because no regular program allows for such an amount to be allocated. It also subsidized the event for three years under the Signature Metropolis Fund, which allowed it to add an additional $1 million in subsidies for this six-day event. Quebec had never used such a strategy before.

These cash subsidies of 9 million are equivalent to 18% of the PGA’s expenses to organize the tournament, indicates the Quebec Ministry of Tourism.

The City of Montreal will provide services, for security and traffic, for example, for a value of 1 million dollars.

The PGA generates annual revenues of US$1.9 billion. In 2023, it reached an agreement in principle to merge with LIV Golf, the professional tour owned by the Saudi Arabian investment fund.

This is the second time Quebec has hosted the Presidents Cup. In 2007, Quebec and Ottawa gave the PGA $2 million in subsidies ($2.9 million in 2024 dollars with inflation). In 2024, the governments paid three times as much, if inflation is taken into account.

To justify its decision, the Legault government claims, among other things, that previous editions of the Presidents Cup, which took place elsewhere in the world, also received public funds. Quebec Tourism Minister Caroline Proulx did not know what amounts. [J’ai] “I just got the information that there is public money that has been put into this. I would like to know how much,” she said in an interview with The Press.

However, the last two American states to host the tournament, North Carolina and New Jersey, did not provide public funds to the Presidents Cup or the PGA to organize this event, which takes place every two years, alternating between the United States and the rest of the world.

“The State of North Carolina has not provided any state funds,” the North Carolina Department of Commerce, which is hosting the 2022 event, said in an email.

“We have no record of any government funding or assistance provided to the PGA or this event in 2017,” a spokeswoman for the New Jersey Secretary of State said in an email.

The cities of Charlotte and Jersey City did not respond to requests for information about whether they subsidized the Presidents Cup.

Australia, for its part, has paid to host the Presidents Cup. The state of Victoria (the equivalent of a province) has entered into a commercial agreement with the PGA to host the tournament in Melbourne in 2028 and 2040. The details of the agreement are confidential, the Victorian premier’s office told us.

Melbourne also hosted the Presidents Cup in 2019. Did Australian taxpayers pay for this tournament? This information is confidential, according to the state of Victoria.

The PGA declined to comment on its past Presidents Cup funding. The PGA “never talks about its relationship with its partners, whether they’re private or government,” said Paul Wilson, senior vice president of the National Public Relations firm, which represents the tour.

Quebec announced its grant in November 2022. Ottawa has not made an official announcement.

To justify the $5 million to $7 million subsidy to the Los Angeles Kings in November 2023, the Legault government used the example of the Presidents Cup. Quebec Finance Minister Eric Girard argued that the subsidy to the Kings was comparable to subsidies given to other events such as “the Presidents Cup in golf, Formula 1 and Mosaïcultures.” “It’s consistent with what we do for other major sporting events,” he said.

Quebec “absolutely” comfortable with the subsidy

Minister Caroline Proulx is “absolutely” comfortable with the $6.5 million paid by Quebec. The Legault government justifies this subsidy by the economic benefits and the international showcase for tourism generated by the event (see other text).

M^me Proulx believes, among other things, that the spending of players and foreign tourists justifies this sum.

Ottawa is also defending its $2.5 million subsidy in the name of economic spinoffs. “Every year, major sporting events attract thousands of visitors and generate millions of dollars in economic spinoffs in Quebec and across Canada,” the office of federal Tourism Minister Soraya Martinez Ferrada said in an email.

Six days of golf, three years of subsidies

Quebec was very imaginative in granting its subsidy to the PGA.

To pay 6.5 million to the PGA, the Legault government is using two programs: one from the Ministry of Tourism, the other, the Fonds signature métropole, under the minister responsible for the Métropole.

The Ministry of Tourism has a program to subsidize one-off events like the Presidents Cup, but the maximum subsidy is $750,000 per event. Quebec therefore had to proceed by decree to pay $5 million, as it did for the subsidy to the Canadian Grand Prix and the Los Angeles Kings.

In the case of the Fonds signature métropole, Quebec paid 1.5 million. However, the conditions of the Fund are clear: “annual financial assistance [du Fonds] is limited to $500,000 per project.” How could $1.5 million be granted to the Presidents Cup, which will not take place until 2024? Quebec has decided to subsidize the event for three years, indicated the Quebec Ministry of Municipal Affairs. Even though the tournament lasts six days.

Since the creation of the Fonds signature métropole, this is the first time that the government has exceeded the ceiling of $500,000 per event by financing over several years an event that only takes place once.

On two occasions, Quebec spread a grant from the Fund over several years for a sporting event (the World Figure Skating Championships in 2020 and the Gymnastics Championships in 2017), but these events each received a total of $500,000, the maximum provided for one year. In both cases, the spirit of the Fund’s rules was respected.

The minister responsible for the Metropolis, Christine Fréchette, did not want to comment on the decision to finance the Presidents Cup for $1.5 million over three years with the Metropolis Signature Fund. The decision had been made by her predecessor, Pierre Fitzgibbon.