Well, for starters Ontario’s provincial government (the Progressive Conservatives led by Doug Ford) just handed an estimated $8b in “free” value to developers t

Well, for starters Ontario’s provincial government (the Progressive Conservatives led by Doug Ford) just handed an estimated $8b in “free” value to developers that owned previously-non-developable protected land on Ontario’s Greenbelt. Conveniently, those developers themselves had direct influence over which parcels would be unlocked. Additionally, some of those same developers made personal appearances at a cash fundraising event for the Premier’s daughter’s wedding. > The political staffer took the instructions from two developers in envelopes handed to him at a September, 2022 dinner hosted by BILD, the principal lobby group for the residential building industry. This is not conjecture, but rather the determination of a newly released report from the province’s auditor general.[1] This is also the same province that leased a major highway, the 150km-long 407, to a private corporation for 99 years for just $3b in 1999 (in a deal facilitated again by the Progressive Conservatives). It is estimated this highway is worth over $30 billion dollars today.[2] --- Now, the Stellaris and Volkswagen deals are a federal/provincial partnership, but my goal here was to highlight that Ontario has a history of self-owns. [1] https://ca.news.yahoo.com/ontario-auditor-general-unwraps-doug-130630018.html https://ca.news.yahoo.com/ontario-auditor-general-unwraps-do... [2] https://www.thespec.com/news/canada/birth-of-a-fiasco-how-the-ontario-tories-completely-botched-the-sale-of-highway-407/ https://www.thespec.com/news/canada/birth-of-a-fiasco-how-th...