Proposal to Remove…

Proposal to Remove Environmental Assessment Requirements for the York1 Waste Disposal Site
— A Pretext for Deregulation Disguised as Emergency Preparedness

This proposal is an unmistakable attempt to erode environmental oversight under the false pretense of economic urgency. The government’s plan to revoke the environmental assessment designation for the York1 Waste Disposal Site in Chatham-Kent—an industrial landfill and waste-processing expansion of significant environmental consequence—is both unjustified and indefensible.

Citing the “threat of US tariffs” as a rationale for bypassing a comprehensive environmental assessment is a political convenience, not a regulatory necessity. Contingency planning for trade instability does not warrant the wholesale dismantling of Ontario’s environmental due diligence. The York1 project proposes reactivating and expanding landfill operations at a site that would balloon from 0.8 hectares of processing to a 25-hectare industrial operation—without the full scrutiny of environmental assessment processes designed specifically to evaluate cumulative impacts, risks to water systems, air quality, ecological integrity, and long-term community health.

Claiming that the project will still be subject to “strong provincial oversight” through Environmental Compliance Approvals is deliberately misleading. ECAs are project-specific and technical in scope; they do not replace the strategic, cumulative, or socio-environmental review functions of a full environmental assessment. That is precisely why these processes exist—and why they were legally required in the first place.

This legislative exemption is not about oversight—it is about eliminating it.

Allowing a private corporation to expand landfill operations in a rural community without a comprehensive environmental review is a direct attack on public transparency, Indigenous rights, and the precautionary principle. The proposal sidelines science, undermines local engagement, and sets a dangerous precedent where corporations can be legislatively shielded from environmental accountability by government fiat.

This project cannot proceed without proper assessment. Revoking Regulation 284/24 and exempting York1 from the Environmental Assessment Act is not just irresponsible—it is a dereliction of duty to the people of Ontario. We reject this proposal unequivocally.

It must be halted.

Bill 5 cannot be allowed. Our environment, rights, and collective future cannot be permitted to become collateral damage in this government's pernicious private-interests pursuit. Bill 5 is not sound economic policy as it is being touted, it is simply another attempt to dismantle environmental protections, erode rights, and offload critical public infrastructure to serve the narrow interests of the wealthiest —often foreign—investors and speculative markets. There is no legitimate rationale for treating public goods as disposable assets for private profit. This is a deliberate transfer of value and control from the public to unaccountable private hands. It undermines long-term stability, democratic oversight, and the foundational principles of a functional and equitable society. It must be halted.