I oppose this act. A…

I oppose this act. A consultation period of 30 days is insufficient for the public to fully study and understand the implications of the act. It should at least be 90 days. Nevertheless, here are my objections based on what I could cover in this limited time.

Firstly, the SEZ act (as well as many other parts of Bill 5) gives broad authority to the government to reward aligned parties. You can see this in the phrasing - "vetted projects" and "trusted proponents". I guess this is a necessary step to allow crony capitalism to fully set in, but one had hoped that there would be at least a decent attempt made at subterfuge.

Secondly, indigenous rights have been completely neglected. These lands are not owned by Ontario. Would the gentlemen who came up with this legislation be so gung ho if this applied to their own private property? I think not.

At a minimum, the following changes are needed:

1. Increase the public consultation period by 60 more days

2. Clearly call out criteria for who qualifies as trusted, how they qualify, the specific transparency metrics that the government will enforce, and the stiff penalties for violating that trust

3. Put an overriding clause that gives the relevant First Nation tribes veto powers over any changes