Reverse course on the…

Reverse course on the proposed Special Economic Zones that would exempt entire regions from provincial laws and environmental safeguards. Forcing projects on Indigenous and other communities, without environmental and health and safety safeguards and without the ability of people affected by these developments to have a say, violates Indigenous and human rights as well as threatens the health and safety of these citizens and their environment. Environmental, planning and public participation rules were instituted for a reason. They were a reaction to the human and environmental health damage that was caused in the past by unchecked, unregulated industrial and other development. They cannot simply be tossed aside now, for the benefit of large corporate interests.

The proposed Bill erodes democratic government. It effectively reverses legislation that holds cabinet accountable to the legislature and concentrates broad-reaching, emergency-level powers in the hands of a few Ministers and special interests without any of the safeguards and restrictions that actual emergency powers have, such as time limits.

As Ontario’s citizens look with horror at what Is happening south of the border, they understand, even more deeply, why it is necessary to uphold democratic values, the separation of powers and the rule of law. Bill 5 erodes all of these principles. Your party did not run on creating lawless zones that risk being used as weapons on marginalized groups, and that give you the power to circumvent the law on ANY property in Ontario.

Your citizens care about democracy and the environment as they demonstrated loudly, publicly and persistently with the Greenbelt protests. A survey done by Environics Research in 2022 revealed that 70% of residents in Ontario agreed with the statement that loss of wildlife and nature is at a crisis point in Canada and we need to act now to reduce the damage. Bill 5, as it is currently proposed, does the opposite.

On behalf of myself and as chair of the 22 group members and hundreds of individual members of Biodiversity and Climate Action Collective Niagara that I represent, I ask that you scrap this Trump-style Bill in its current form and find ways to make Ontario’s econo,my more resilient while protecting the resilience of our environment and the rights of the province’s people.