Quebec has granted financial support of more than $19 million to Nova Bus to “improve its productivity” and “ensure the sustainability of its operations” while the bus manufacturer prepares to reduce its workforce by 125 people by January 2025.
The government is granting a forgivable loan of $19.1 million to Nova Bus through Investissement Québec under a decree adopted on January 31, according to the Quebec Official Gazette published Wednesday.
The loan aims “to improve the productivity of its factories located in the territory of the city of Saint-Eustache and the municipality of Saint-François-du-Lac and ensure the sustainability of its operations,” according to the decree.
A few days after the adoption of the decree, Nova Bus announced to its employees that it intended to reduce its workforce by 125 positions at its Saint-Eustache factory by the end of the year.
The Volvo Group subsidiary then explained that the announcement was linked to the decision to close its Plattsburgh plant and concentrate on the Canadian market. The change in strategy required an adjustment in staffing levels.
Nova Bus assured that the workforce reduction would not have an effect on the company’s Quebec contracts and that the affected positions were linked to activities in Plattsburgh.
Government assistance would ensure the maintenance of jobs in the long term, once the layoffs linked to the closure of the Plattsburgh factory are carried out, said a spokesperson for the Ministry of the Economy.
Nova Bus also defends that government aid and its restructuring remain two separate files. “The government loan, for its part, differs from this restructuring, and will help support our operations at our two factories in Quebec, particularly the acceleration of the production of electric urban buses,” says spokesperson Alexandrine Gauvin.
Nova Bus was awarded a $2.1 billion contract last spring to build 1,229 electric buses on behalf of 10 public transit companies.
The company has 1,350 employees in its factories in Saint-Eustache and Saint-François-du-Lac.