COLUMN: Think Again – NDP regulations are increasing construction costs

Premier Wab Kinew often says one thing and does another.

Kinew says he wants to make life more affordable for Manitobans, but then his government enacts policies that do exactly the opposite. The Manitoba Jobs Agreement (MJA) is a prime example.

Announced in September 2025, the MJA applies to all public construction projects valued at $50 million and above. According to a media release issued at the time, the MJA will ensure that Manitoba companies get priority on major projects and that workers receive good wages, benefits, and working conditions.

At first glance, this sounds reasonable. Who could possibly be against good wages for workers?

As usual, the devil is in the details. Far from being an innocuous agreement between the government and industry representatives, the MJA puts regulations in place that potentially increase construction costs by as much as 20 percent.

For example, the MJA mandates that any construction company that bids on a large government project must prioritize union workers when hiring extra staff and pay a fee of 85 cents per hour for each worker. When you consider the man-hours involved in a multi-million-dollar project, the 85 cent per hour surcharge becomes quite hefty indeed.

To put it more directly, a $50 million construction project is estimated to need approximately 500,000 man-hours. Multiply that by 0.85 and that comes to an extra payment of $425,000, which of course gets added to the total cost of the project.

Even more concerning is the fact that it’s unclear what the money is being used for. The 85 cent surcharge is paid to Manitoba Building Trades, which is a coalition of labour unions. When asked earlier this year where this money was going, Public Service Delivery Minister Mintu Sidhu said that this money was being used for training.

However, the minister couldn’t provide any details about what type of training was being provided. Tanya Paulson, the executive director of Manitoba Building Trades, recently said that some of this money will also be used to cover administrative costs.

In other words, the government needs to charge a fee to cover the costs of administering the fee it needs to charge. Makes perfect sense—to NDP politicians.

Concerns about how the MJA will increase total construction costs are not merely theoretical. Organizations such as the Winnipeg Construction Association, the Construction Association of Rural Manitoba, and the Manitoba Heavy Construction Association issued a joint statement earlier this year pointing out that the MJA will result in higher construction costs.

As a case in point, the Construction Association of Rural Manitoba recently pointed out it will cost as much as 20 percent more to build the planned new school in Brandon. They point out that forcing non-unionized companies to hire unionized employees is a surefire way to increase costs. Add to this the 85 cent per hour surcharge and it’s not hard to see why construction costs will be unreasonably high.

This means that some construction companies will either avoid bidding on large government projects entirely or significantly increase their bids to compensate for their increased expenses. Either way, this leads to construction inflation.

Higher construction costs impact all Manitobans. When the government imposes regulations that inflate the cost of its own projects, taxpayers are stuck making up the difference. This makes life less affordable for all of us.

If Premier Wab Kinew is serious about making life more affordable, he must drop his NDP ideology and focus instead on common-sense solutions. The last thing we need is a government more focused on rewarding its friends than on helping Manitobans.

Michael Zwaagstra is a teacher and deputy mayor of Steinbach. He can be reached at mzwaagstra@shaw.ca.