https://www.theglobeandmail.com/
Ontario Premier Doug Ford – facing opposition from First Nations over a bill allowing “special economic zones” where mines or other projects could be exempt from any provincial law – is pledging to include provisions for similar Indigenous-led zones but still vowing to pass his controversial legislation.
Bill 5, which has sparked warnings of protests from First Nations leaders who say they have not been consulted, is aimed at accelerating Ontario’s sluggish mine approval process, particularly in the remote northern Ring of Fire region. The government says critical mineral reserves there are key to Ontario’s future economic resilience in the face of U.S. tariffs.
Opposition critics and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association have called the bill’s sweeping powers an anti-democratic overreach for potentially allowing exemptions from provincial environmental or labour laws. Environmentalists have pointed to provisions they say would gut protections for endangered species.
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