Miramichi Lumber has announced it is suing the provincial government. In a release issued today, the company says it has suffered damages as result of what the company says is the provinces failure to honour its agreement allocation saw logs to the company from Crown forests. The statement of claim was served on July 10. We had no other options. The government pretty much backed us into a wall, CEO Danny Anderson told 95.9 Sun FM. He said there has been no dollar figure assigned to the file yet, but the end goal is to receive allocation. Were just looking for our allocation. What our agreement was when we started the mill he said. Miramichi Lumber was incorporated in 2009 and operates out of the former Newcastle Lumber mill, which many people still refer to as the Anderson Mill. The company says private shareholders invested more than $5 million in the company. The mill uses only saw logs, and the company says it was limited 49,000 cubic metres of saw logs for the year ending March 31. According to the company release, the initial agreement with the province was for a permanent allocation of 126,500 cubic metres of saw logs, with a later agreement for an additional 39,500. The company has been in a pitch public relations battle with the province for more than a year now. The company employees around 75 people in Miramichi and Boiestown but has had to shut down for months at a time to build up wood supply. Speaking on the subject last year, Premier David Alward said province is not stopping Miramichi Lumber from harvesting on Crown lands. I believe Miramichi Lumber has an allocation of 126,000 or so cubic metres of wood. Last year, they harvested 39,000 cubic metres off their available. This year, thus far, theyve only harvested 36,000 cubic metres of wood, he said. So the wood piece is not the issue or Ill say the only issue. Part of the issue is the mill can only use saw logs and not stud logs, meaning much of the wood they can cut from the allocation they are not equipt to use. The company is also behind a $190 million project called Miramichi Fibre. At a Miramichi Chamber of Commerce event earlier this month, the premier said he was willing to sit down and discuss it, but Anderson said that has not happened. Zero, Anderson said. Still waiting. We got investors now that are calling me trying to find out whats going on, why they are getting such a cold shoulder. We have groups that are looking to finance the whole project, all of them, and theyve contacted the province and theyre just getting the cold shoulder.
Posted on: Sun, 27 Jul 2014 10:23:40 +0000