
[ad_1]
By Ian Pattison
Why is it that, while things are getting worse, the government is not getting better? We choose political parties based on propositions that resonate with us. Then we watch how they change, especially with trials, or because of them.
Here are some examples.
Doug Ford sells himself as a friend to all men and women. A straight-shootin’ guy you’d see in the pub drinking beer with the boys. Except these days, it’s more likely to be Blue at Grossman’s than Macallan at Canoe on the 54th floor of the TD Bank tower.
Lately Ford has been showing himself to be more of a business friend than anyone else. He glossed over the evidence of damage and promised to build a new highway in southern Ontario because it would save commuters a lot of time. Someone did the math and found that drivers could save a few minutes.
Fewer polluting vehicles on existing highways should be the goal, especially with so many public transportation alternatives. Down there instead of driving you can take subways and streetcars, GO trains and Via trains. But Ford pressed on as reporters investigated who owned the land along the Highway 413 route.
Surprise! It’s a group of big-time donors to Ford’s Progressive Conservatives who make millions.
Eight of Ontario’s most powerful land developers own thousands of acres of prime real estate near a proposed highway route, a National Observer/Torstar investigation has found. Four of the developers are connected to Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government through party officials and former Tory politicians who now act as registered lobbyists.
If built, the road would destroy 2,000 hectares of farmland, cross 85 waterways and pave nearly 400 hectares of protected Greenbelt land. It will disrupt 220 wetlands and the habitats of 10 species-at-risk, according to the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority.
The value of those lands could increase dramatically if the highway is built and residential, commercial and industrial development is allowed to spread along the route.
The bully tactic mirrors Ford’s latest legislation, the More Homes Built Faster Act that aims to build 1.5 million homes by 2031.
Funds now paid to municipalities by developers for building rights are capped and then phased out. Municipalities will lose millions.
Also limits inclusionary zoning, a program that requires developers to build a percentage of affordable units in new developments. This in the midst of the worst affordable housing crisis in recent memory.
Enabling Bill 23 proposes to “renew and update heritage policies,” which advocates say make it nearly impossible to protect most of the province’s identified heritage properties.
The changes in Bill 23 would greatly reduce the scope of the province’s 36 conservation authorities in the development process and prohibit them from offering their expertise outside of their “core mandate” of flood risks and erosion, even if municipalities ask them to.
As if to stick the knife in, the province asked conservation authorities to “identify lands owned or controlled by the conservation authority that could support housing development.”
Several well-known developers are also among the owners of 15 parcels of land that the Ford government is proposing to open up for housing in the protected Greenbelt in the Greater Toronto Area. Deja vu again.
Does Ontario need more housing? Absolutely. Does it have to be built on sensitive lands and remove provincial oversight while blatantly enriching Ford’s developer friends? Nope. Streamline the existing approval process, don’t exhaust it.
OUT in Alberta this week, new Premier Danielle Smith made a prime-time TV address to cover up some damage with piles of cash.
Smith will reach into deep provincial coffers enriched by rising oil and gas revenues to provide payments to families and income supports to shore them up with inflation and high prices. The provincial fuel tax will be waived and there will be electricity bill rebates.
This and more will cost $2.9 billion and while eligible Albertans with household incomes under $180,000 will certainly receive it (for once, government assistance goes to long-suffering middle type as well as low-income people) its six-month operating window will occur. to coincide with the period leading up to the next Alberta election which current polls show Rachel Notley’s NDP will win.
Almost as an afterthought the TV address mentioned the now better named Alberta Sovereignty Within a United Canada Act. Originally called the Alberta Sovereignty Act, it caused an uproar across the country because of its promise – actually threat – to somehow allow Alberta to ignore the enforcement of federal laws it doesn’t like.
“The government in Ottawa is deliberately and systematically trying to control and manage all aspects of our province’s economy, resources and social programs,” said Smith, whose exuberance has reached new heights.
The University of Calgary Faculty of Law released a paper saying the law is “fundamentally inconsistent” with the rule of law, the separation of powers between the three branches of government, and the division of powers between the federal and provincial legislature. Watching Smith try to extricate himself from that conundrum will be a sight to behold.
The premier ended his address by apologizing for a series of stumbles since he won the United Conservative leadership race in early October. There was support for Russian disinformation about the war in Ukraine, a dubious claim to have Cherokee heritage, and calling the unvaccinated the most discriminated against people he had ever seen.
In that final disagreement, he fired the medical officer of health and fired the entire board of Alberta Health Services, replacing it with an administrator who shared his view that vaccine mandates were incorrect.
Alone among premiers, he vowed never to re-impose any pandemic-related order, not even a mask mandate. He asked his justice minister to remove the power of school boards to impose their own mask mandates.
The poll found that many Albertans see health care as the biggest problem facing the province and see Smith as the least trusted leader to fix it. Damn the torpedoes, just get it done, Smith seems to be saying.
It is as if these people are using the fact that our attention is focused on the weakness of the economy to carry out measures that would otherwise not dare to see the light of day. Actually, that is not “seemingly” the case, that is exactly what is happening and all Canadians should be concerned about it.
Ian Pattison has retired after 50 years of award-winning journalism at The Chronicle-Journal, but still shares his thoughts on current affairs.
[ad_2]
Source link