Three weeks ago, Mark Carney announced his plan to open up Canada’s four largest airports—Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, and Calgary—to private investments.

The goal, as explained by the prime minister during his speech at the Canada Investment Summit in Toronto, is to “unlock their true value by bringing in new capital.” Meanwhile, the government will retain ownership of the underlying land and assets.

Proponents say the plan will increase the airports’ efficiency, bring down the cost of flying, and generate additional revenue to fund Canadian infrastructures.

Critics, on the other hand, are skeptical that the initiative really will result in lower airfares and warn that it could weaken protections for workers.

Isaac Peltz is among those who believe that privatizing Canadian airports is a “terrible idea.”

“The biggest advocate for change is private industry. It loves when major infrastructure gets turned over to them. For them, it’s win-win. But for Canadians, it’s lose-lose,” the Montreal-based journalist argues for The Walrus.

According to Peltz, Canada’s own history has shown this strategy to be unproductive. They contend that the privatization of Canadian National Railway (CN) in 1995 by then prime minister Jean Chrétien, for example, led to worse outcomes for both workers and consumers.

“Consumers lose because what was proposed as a cheaper alternative to a government monopoly is controlled by the company’s profit motive. Labourers lose because of low wages. All while private investors are making huge dividends and prices continue to rise,” they write.

The idea that airfares could rise post-privatization of operations in Canadian airports has been front of mind for many skeptics. In the days following Carney’s announcement, Transport Minister Steven MacKinnon recognized that the decision to open up to private investments would introduce new incentives to increase profits but assured that there would be protections against “unjustified” price increases, in an interview with the Toronto Star.

Peltz wonders why the Liberals want to open up Canada’s airports to private investments. In looking for an answer, they enlisted the help of software developer Aedan Burnett to review the federal government’s lobbying records, which are publicly available. Together, they found that since April 2025, there have been 328 recorded instances of lobbying of Liberal politicians by companies involved in the aviation sector.

“Lobbying,” they note, “is not illegal and does not necessarily reflect wrongdoing or malicious intent. However, there is little public data available on what these meetings are about or what is said during.”

The Walrus asked the office for the Minister of Transport whether lobbying pressure was the driving force for the initiative, who responded that they were engaged with all interested parties.

If you want to understand why Isaac Peltz thinks privatizing airports is a “terrible idea” for Canadians, read their full story in The Walrus.

And if you really can’t get enough of reading about Canada’s airports, check out Olivia Bowden’s piece from September about Mark Carney’s investment summit for additional context.