Doug Ford, Ontario Premier

While Ontario’s Ford government has proven to be an able defender of health in the face of COVID-19, it continues to be a profound threat to the environment, gutting established protections, hobbling climate action at every opportunity and, most recently, hamstringing the province’s environmental review process.

With the recent passage of Bill 197, which purports to support economic recovery from the pandemic, full environmental reviews will no longer be a default requirement for construction or industrial projects in Ontario, writes David Israelson in an op-ed for the Toronto Star.

With cabinet effectively now in charge of deciding whether a given piece of infrastructure— a road, gas plant, or water treatment facility, for example—needs a full environmental review, the province has reverted back to 1970 in terms of protecting the environment. And the law was rushed through, too, adds Israelson: “The Ford government waived the usual 30-day time for consulting the public before passing this legislation.”

Bill 197 is the latest in Ford’s barrage of regressive assaults against environmental health: from hollowing out of Ontario’s endangered species protection laws, to repealing laws that forced companies to keep a record of the toxins they use or create, to closing the office of the province’s environmental commissioner.

Source: Ontario’s Ford Government Guts Environmental Protections, Undermines Health Record – The Energy Mix