Bas-Caraquet shipyard encounters more financial trouble

Quebec-based Groupe Océan, a key player at the New Brunswick Naval Centre, has filed a lien against the facility for almost $717,000.

• Bas-Caraquet shipyard silent on use of millions from government
• New Brunswick Naval Centre government funding cut off

The company says it hasn't been paid for workers and materials it supplied to the shipyard's main building for work that wrapped up in September.

Groupe Océan is the fourth company to file a lien against the Naval Centre, bringing the total in unpaid bills to about $2.2 million.

But it's potentially the most important because the business plan for the shipyard is based on Groupe Océan becoming its anchor customer.

The company has promised to invest $29 million of its own money in the yard over five years as part of an agreement that will see it build a floating drydock at the site, and potentially use the yard in the future to repair its boats.

Opportunities New Brunswick, the province's job-creation agency, is set to provide $3.8 million in payroll rebates to Groupe Océan based on a projection of 77 jobs created. None of that money has been handed over.

The province also committed to $4 million infrastructure money to help fund construction at the shipyard, though the government froze that funding when the yard's money problems began.

Three other companies, all of them in northeast New Brunswick, filed liens against the naval centre earlier this fall. A lien is a way of claiming part of a property to protect a contractor's right to be paid for work done.

Company still confident

But Groupe Océan spokesperson Philippe Fillion says the liens, and the money problems at the shipyard, have not made the Quebec company nervous about its role in Bas-Caraquet.

It does not put in doubt Groupe Océan's role in New Brunswick.- Groupe Océan spokesman Phillippe Fillion

A lien is "a normal process" in the construction business and it doesn't endanger the overall project, Fillion said.

"We are very confident it will go ahead as planned," he said. "It does not put in doubt Groupe Océan's role in New Brunswick."

A spokeperson for the province's Regional Development Corporation, which was providing the $4 million in infrastructure, said on Oct. 23 that it would take about two weeks to resolve the money problems at the Naval Centre.

Earlier this month, Caraquet Mayor Kevin Haché, a member of the naval centre's board, said the cash crunch was because banks wanted his town and the Village of Bas-Caraquet to guarantee their loans. The municipalities couldn't do that, he said.