On the primary day again to Queen’s Park after a 19-week break from the legislature, Waterloo MPP Catherine Fife criticized the provincial authorities for his or her function within the area’s plans to buy land in Wilmot Township.
“The Wilmot land meeting is that this authorities’s subsequent Greenbelt scandal. Wilmot has change into floor zero for farmers throughout this province,” Fife stated throughout query interval on Monday morning.
Fife stated Premier Doug Ford had criticized the area for not being extra clear concerning the course of “however we now know that it was this authorities that set the phrases on the market, pressured the non-disclosure agreements and are totally funding the acquisition and/or expropriation of farmland.”
In March of this yr, 12 property homeowners in Wilmot township close to the intersection of Nafziger Highway and Bleams Highway have been advised the Area of Waterloo wished to buy their land. The area has stated the 770 acres (roughly 311 hectares) just isn’t for a particular undertaking, however the land could be used for future industrial functions.
In July, the area introduced it had bought one-third of the land it wished to amass within the space. However some landowners within the space and advocates have criticized the area’s plan, saying it might take away prime agricultural land. Different politicians have additionally criticized the transfer, together with Ontario NDP Chief Marit Stiles and township councillors Harvir Sidhu and Kris Wilkinson.
The undertaking has been supported by native enterprise and tech leaders, who’ve advocated for it to maneuver ahead as a part of a bunch known as BESTWR.
In August, Kitchener-Conestoga MPP and Minister of Pink Tape Discount Mike Harris and Minister of Financial Growth, Job Creation and Commerce Vic Fedeli confirmed the province is offering the area with funding. However in a joint assertion, the 2 criticized the area for a “lack of transparency” within the course of.
That criticism was a shock to regional Chair Karen Redman.
“I am stunned and I am confused as a result of from the very starting of this undertaking we labored in lockstep with the province,” Redman stated in a telephone interview on the time.
‘No totally different’ than different meeting initiatives: Minister
On Monday, Fife additionally stated the plans to buy the farmland go towards a brand new set of planning guidelines — known as a provincial planning assertion — which got here into impact on Sunday.
“Will you cease funding and driving this industrial website on class 1 farmland, which overrides native democracies and fails rural communities in Ontario?” Fife requested of the premier.
Agriculture Minister Rob Flack responded to say the land meeting is the “sole accountability” of the area.
“Our expectation is that the area deal with farmers pretty and respectfully in assembling the land. It’s no totally different than some other main funding or meeting undertaking,” Flack stated.
He likened it to the 2023 land meeting wanted to convey Volkswagen’s first North American electrical car battery plant to St. Thomas, Ont., which Flack stated the NDP supported.
“We consider within the delicate however vital steadiness between a thriving farm and agri-food sector, whereas supporting progress, new investments and good paying jobs additionally within the agri-food processing sector,” he stated.
In her second query, Fife stated the federal government was “funding the displacement of farmers” and the province is “in the end accountable” for that.
Fedeli responded to Fife’s second query and stated the area lacks shovel-ready websites and the province is “doing our half” to assist “huge job creating investments” come to the area and province.
