MP hopes the PEI-Nova Scotia ferry can resume service this weekend

According to an island MP and the manager of Northumberland Ferries, the ferry service between PEI and Nova Scotia could run as early as Canada Day weekend.

MV Confederation has been sidelined since June 17 due to mechanical problems. It required a special part that was manufactured in Germany.

Lawrence MacAulay, the MP for riding Cardigan in eastern PEI, sent out a tweet on Wednesday saying the part will be shipped from Germany this week and that the Confederacy could “turn again this weekend”.

The ferry service is operated by Northumberland Ferries Ltd., which charters vessels owned by Transport Canada.

Mark Wilson, senior vice president of Northumberland Ferries Ltd., confirmed MacAulay’s tweet in an email response to CBC News on Wednesday.

“NFL should be able to provide more exact details by Friday morning,” he said.

No plans for compensation

When it went out of service this spring, MV Confederation was the only ferry operating between Wood Islands, PEI and Caribou, NS. A second ferry, MV Saaremaa 1, will come on loan from Quebec in mid-July. It was intended to run in conjunction with the Confederacy during the busy summer months.

Businesses in the area say they have lost customers due to the closure of the ferry service at the start of the busy tourist season.

However, in an email to CBC News, Transport Canada said it is “not considering any form of compensation for users affected by the outage.”

The statement continued, “Over the past two seasons of operation, Transport Canada has provided the ferry company with an operating grant of nearly $14 million annually to provide ferry service between Wood Islands and Caribou.”