Indigenous Land Defenders and their supporters are preparing for a summer of resistance, seeking to overturn an Ontario provincial government bill that rolls back decades of hard-won progress on environmental and Indigenous land rights protections. Bill 5, titled the Protect Ontario by Unleashing our Economy Act, claims the potential impacts of US President Trump’s tariff threats as justification to slash regulations for the approval of large-scale industrial projects.
The broadest and most concerning effect of Bill 5 is that it allows the provincial government to designate “special economic zones” in which it can exempt companies or projects from complying with provincial or municipal laws and regulations. There are no stated limits on this power: the government could use this provision to exempt companies from any requirements for environmental protections, consultation with Indigenous communities, and labour regulations. Government ministers have openly discussed applying this designation to the “Ring of Fire,” a region in northern Ontario with extensive mineral deposits.
Indigenous leaders in the region have immediately mobilized to express their opposition and their intent to resist. In an open letter, Donny Morris, Chief of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, stated, “These lands are not Ontario’s to do with as they wish. They are our ancestral lands. We have always been here and are going nowhere … Whatever Ford and his government might want their base to think, nothing is happening up here without our consent.” Leaders from First Nations including Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, Neskantaga and Grassy Narrows travelled over 1,000 km to the Ontario legislature in Toronto to protest the bill. They promised to resist the bill in court, in the media, and if necessary, on the land.
Indigenous communities are not alone in opposing the bill. Environmentalists, labour unions, civil liberties advocates, farmers, and local communities affected by proposed industrial projects have all protested Bill 5. Overturning the bill, however, will be a complex struggle as Canada’s federal government has now put forward Bill C-5, a law with similar provisions to exempt industrial projects from environmental regulations based on “national interest.”
Please pray for:
- Support for Indigenous leaders resisting Bill 5
- Safety and support for Land Defenders camped outside the Ontario legislature
- Collaborative relationships among social movements opposing Bill 5
- Courage for allies to show up and take risks in solidarity with Indigenous communities
- Growing public consciousness and action to stop the erosion of rights and protections.
