Attacking Ontario's heritage…

Attacking Ontario's heritage protections under the guise of "fast tracking construction" threatens Ontario's upstanding history as a leader in cultural heritage management and archaeological mitigation processes, without solving the actual issues at the heart of it. Concerns about delays due to archaeological assessments can largely be attributed to the ministry responsible for report review and approval, who have consistently been slow to approve, often acting as a bottleneck for approval, when both the client and the archaeologists are impatiently waiting on the ministry's approval. Bill 5 only avoids actual solutions in favour of blindly allowing construction without consideration of its consequences. Using Bill 5 to erode heritage protections in Ontario only bludgeons our social protections in a Trump-esque fashion, and will result in severely damaged public trust, and absolutely will result in major conflicts with First Nations communities in the future.