Ontario Throne Speech pledges to drop provincial trade barriers, speed up mines in face of U.S. trade war

Open this photo in gallery:

The Ontario government, facing what it calls “chaos” caused by U.S. President Donald Trump, is pledging to dismantle interprovincial trade barriers and accelerate approvals for new mines in the northern Ring of Fire region, while doubling down on a promise to build a costly tunnel under the Toronto-area portion of Highway 401.

In its Speech from the Throne, a parliamentary ritual meant to lay out a government’s agenda, the province said “tough decisions” were needed to make Ontario more resilient in the face of the economic uncertainty brought about by Mr. Trump’s tariffs.

Read in the legislature by Lieutenant-Governor Edith Dumont, but drafted by the elected government, the Throne Speech follows the re-election of Premier Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives to a third consecutive majority after a snap vote on Feb. 27.

The speech warned that Mr. Trump “is openly taking aim at Ontario’s economy and our national sovereignty” and has “even threatened to use economic force to break our country.”

“This, of course, will never happen. Because Canada is not for sale,” Ms. Dumont told MPPs, echoing a line Mr. Ford has used repeatedly. “Canada will never be the 51st state.”

A bill that would dismantle some of Ontario’s barriers to trade with other provinces was to be unveiled on Wednesday. Mr. Ford had said Monday that other premiers would be on hand including Nova Scotia’s Tim Houston, who has also tabled similar legislation in his province aimed at mitigating the economic damage of U.S. tariffs.

The Throne Speech also promised that Ontario will advocate for “new pipelines eastward, westward, north and south, connecting Alberta oil to new refineries, new tidewater, and beyond it, new markets.”

While Mr. Ford has spent months pitching the public and U.S. officials on a vision of closer co-operation he calls “Fortress Am-Can,” the speech says Ontario and Canada will have to become less reliant on the United States, which it labelled “fundamentally unreliable.” But the government will still “engage with American lawmakers in good-faith discussions.”

The speech also reaffirmed Ontario’s multibillion-dollar subsidies to several major automakers for electric-vehicle and battery plants. It also warned that whatever party forms government in Ottawa after this month’s federal election must do the same. While former prime minister Justin Trudeau supported the deals, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has been critical of the subsidies.

Ontario’s so-called Ring of Fire, a large area about 500 kilometres north of Thunder Bay, is the “front line in Canada’s battle against President Trump’s economic threats,” the speech said, citing its reserves of key minerals, including cobalt and nickel used in batteries.

The area has long been a focus for Mr. Ford. But efforts to build expensive all-season roads and open mines there have long crawled at a snail’s pace amid questions about the viability of the deposits, environmental reviews and First Nations opposition, although some Indigenous groups support mining there.

Ontario intends to introduce legislation allowing it to designate the Ring of Fire and other areas where critical minerals may be present as regions of “strategic importance to the province’s economy and security interests.” The government says its new rules would allow for faster approvals for mining companies that “meet high operating, safety and environmental standards” – without affecting Indigenous consultations.

But First Nations leaders are sounding alarms. NDP deputy leader Sol Mamakwa, a First Nations MPP who represents the massive northern riding of Kiiwetinoong, told reporters the government should not use the U.S. tariffs as a pretense to override the rights of Indigenous people.

“If they continue to do that, they’re going to have some pushback. And it’s not just going to be the fight in the courtrooms,” Mr. Mamakwa said. “It’s going to be the fight on the lands.”

The government also pledged to further streamline the environmental assessment process for major projects and “bring common-sense conservation principles” both to local conservation authorities and “species-at-risk requirements.” Environmentalists have long criticized the Ford government for loosening regulations in these areas already.

The speech repeated Mr. Ford’s pledge to dig a tunnelled “expressway and transitway” under what the Premier has said could be as much as 60 kilometres of the congested Highway 401 through the Toronto area. No price tag has ever been mentioned, but experts have said such a tunnel could cost $60-billion to $120-billion or more and would not solve Toronto’s traffic woes. A feasibility study is expected to take two years.

Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie said she was concerned about Mr. Ford’s “fantasy tunnel” and warned that watering down environmental assessments sounds “reckless.” She also said the speech offered nothing to ease the cost of living, such as tax cuts, but welcomed the move to lower interprovincial trade barriers.

Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said she was alarmed there was nothing in the speech that addressed the problems in health care.

The speech touted the government’s “unprecedented investments” in health care and pledged to use “Lean methodology” to find efficiencies in struggling emergency rooms. And it warned against “dogmatic ideology,” in a reference to the opposition government has faced for its push to move more surgeries into private clinics.

With a report from Tamara Merritt