Back to the Minister of Mines: Do you know that it’s colonial to divide and conquer First Nations?

I heard that. The member said it wasn’t appropriate.

A lot of this bill really is about the Premier saying, “Trust us.” At the end of question period, the Premier came over and talked to me. He said, “I hope I’ll have your support on this bill”—and unfortunately, he doesn’t. There are parts of it that I think are going to help, but there are parts of it that are damaging and parts of it that are weakening, and I do not trust that things will go well. When the Premier and the Conservative government don’t provide free, prior and informed consent to Indigenous communities before tabling this bill, I do not trust that he will do it before moving forward with mining applications.

Neskantaga First Nation has come several times. The first time I met them was in MPP Mamakwa’s office, and they had a bottle of water—I had heard about the polluted water in the past, but I hadn’t seen it. It is visibly polluted. I always thought there were chemicals in it that would be harmful to drink; you can see in it that it is—it looks a little like swamp water. It is cloudy and unclear, and there are bits of debris in it. You don’t need a microscope to understand. When I spoke with these members of this community about the water that they brought from Neskantaga, they told me that even in Toronto, where they’re told that the water is safe to drink, they will not drink the water, because this has been going on for generations—28 years without clean water: “My oldest just turned 26, so for more than his lifetime, I could not bathe him. I couldn’t give him water out of the tap to drink. I couldn’t clean his clothes. These are all basic things. When he spit up on me, I couldn’t have a shower.”

You cannot go forward and say, “Trust us. It’s going to work out,” when you have communities like this who have been unable to trust multiple governments—not just the Conservatives, multiple governments—for 28 years. The last time the government said “trust us” was 28 years ago. If you waited 28 years for clean drinking water, would you trust the government? If they tabled a bill without speaking to you, would you trust the government? Would you think, “Oh, next time”? This is a “the cheque is in the mail” conversation. None of us believe people when they say the cheque is in the mail.

Honestly, with the Conservative record on the environment, I do not trust them. It has not been a good record.

In Alberta, the Conservative government of Alberta told the citizens to trust them—this is about oil lines and gas lines—that industry will do the right thing and the polluters will pay to clean up their mess. And I think that the company that made the mess—there’s high risk, there’s high reward. When you see mining companies post profits with a billion per quarter, they’re doing all right. They have to have the structure in place to restore things and to clean up the environment where they do business, and so weakening it doesn’t make any sense.

In Alberta, there are currently 170,000 abandoned oil wells. That’s 37% of all their oil wells that are abandoned. Do you know who’s going to pay to clean those up? It’s not the oil companies that made the money; it’s the taxpayers. Even if it cost a dollar, it’s going to cost taxpayers $170,000 to clean up these abandoned wells. But it’s not going to cost a dollar; it’s going to cost a fortune to clean up these wells.

What the Conservative government did in Alberta is that they started offering royalty money—so taxpayers’ dollars—to these companies to pay them with taxpayer money to clean up the mess that they made while getting profitable. Think about that for a second. I think about starting a small business, maybe a coffee shop, and I’m worried about the risk if my coffee shop isn’t successful. So I go to the government and I say, “I’d like to open a coffee shop, but I don’t want any risk. Can you buy all of the infrastructure for me? And if my coffee shop goes under, if I’m not able to make ends meet, I’d like to just leave, and then someone else can clean it up for me.” That’s kind of what they’re saying on this, and it doesn’t make any sense. It doesn’t make sense because people understand that business is about risk. It’s great to want to minimize risk for people and make it better for people to want to invest, but “minimize” and” eliminate” are different. And basically telling people who have mining companies building and developing in their communities, “Trust us, they’ll clean it up”—well, the history hasn’t been great for cleaning up. I talked about Sudbury several times—it hasn’t been great.

I talked about these oil wells in Alberta. I think on this plan that the Conservatives in Alberta are doing, where they’re paying companies who refuse to clean the land taxpayer money to clean up their own mess—it kind of goes in the face of the quote that the company that made the mess and profited from it has to clean it up, and I think that’s why the Globe called it corporate welfare. Previously, they gave a $1-billion payout by the federal government to deal with some of the damage—so at both levels they’re getting a payout, from the federal and provincial governments. It’s easy to brush that aside and say, “That’s oil wells. That would never happen for mining because mining is totally different.”

What could go wrong in mining? Ironically, the first place we travelled to when we travelled the bill was Timmins, and outside of Timmins is the Kam Kotia mine disaster. This is Ontario’s most notorious mine waste project. They had a mine in Kam Kotia, and they abandoned it—and this was years ago, before the legislation was strengthened. It was an American company, and then a couple of junior ones tried to take it over and make a run at it. Basically, they ran for a while and they mined, and they left a mess behind, and now taxpayers are ponying up $28 million to fix this mess. Speaker, $28 million dollars is a lot of money. Whenever I hear the Conservative government talk about, “If we had the money, we could invest in schools and health care”—well, if you didn’t give $28 million away to the Kam Kotia mine disaster, we would have that money. Some of the examples they talk about in the description—the mine only operated from September 1943 until December 1944, and its legacy still lingers on. If you were to go there, you would see that “dead trees sticking out of the swamp and rotting vegetation create a scene from a Hollywood horror movie. Oxidation of sulphide in the mine tailings (treated remains of ore) and waste rock causes an acidic runoff affecting creeks and rivers close to the mine.” So those all flow. There are about 200,000 tonnes of waste rock and six million tonnes of mine tailings on the site. So when the Conservative government and the Premier are saying, “Trust us,” or “I hope I can count on your support, Jamie,” I think of the $28 million that taxpayers had to pay to clean up this one mine site four hours north of Sudbury, and I don’t really trust on this issue.

I’ve already talked about the director, so I’m going to skip over that.

Interjection.

Oh, I thought I did.

The member from Oshawa is saying I didn’t talk about “better than” and “comparable to.”

Interjection.

I think this is a funny one, but just because I have the time to talk about it—there has been a lot of discussion about the 15 years to open a mine site. I made a comment when I was doing the lead debate at second reading on this, and I explained that 15 years is kind of normal. Conservatives have been all over the place, that it shouldn’t be 15 years for an open-pit mine, it shouldn’t be 15 years for a—I don’t care. If you’re planting crops and you’re upset that it takes a growing season to grow your crops, you’re not being realistic. That’s just what it takes. If we can shorten the time and get it to less than 15 years, by all means, let’s do that. But if you’re going to stand here and tell me that you can open a mine and you want to cut it down by bypassing the protections that are in place—there are all kinds of FEL studies, there are investments, there are environmental studies, there’s all kinds of stuff that has to happen, and winter also throws a wrench into things. So it really shouldn’t be something that we’re arguing about; it’s just the reality of the workplace.

Anyone going around Toronto, when you see a skyscraper being built—it takes time to build a skyscraper. I’d love it to be done tomorrow. They’re building near my place, and it’s super loud. It would be great if it only took a month. It just takes a little bit longer. People are working. It takes time.

It’s also a little misleading, I think, to say that no one’s employed until the 15 years is over. The bulk of your employees don’t show up, but there are people who work all the way through that. The prospector is working before that. The people who are doing the core samples are working before that. The engineers are working before that. The environmental specialists are working before that. There is a lot of work going on.

I talked about the minister’s powers. I’ve mentioned several times my respect for the minister and his knowledge of the mining industry. But ministries don’t last. Cabinets will shuffle. Governments rise and fall. The parliamentary assistant, for example—I believe his background is in law; I don’t know if it’s in mining law. As much information as the minister has with his lifelong knowledge—I’m sure he learned a lot under his father before he was working in the industry, and then while working in the industry—when we make this change, this change lasts forever, until it’s amended.

The knowledge that the Minister of Mines has right now could change if there’s a cabinet shuffle or if he decides not to run again in the future or if anything happens, and it could just land in anyone’s hands. They’ll do the best they can, but honestly, they will not have the institutional knowledge that the director will have. They won’t have that framework to be able to share. And any decision that the minister makes, just because of the nature of where we work, will be considered as partisan—even if it’s not, it will always be looked at as a partisan lens because all of this in this House are seen as party members. All the ministers are Conservative. The opposition members are New Democrats. The independent members are Liberal and Green. Two are just independent, but most of us are seen with whatever colour is part of our party, and it’s very difficult, if the minister makes a decision, for it not to be seen as a Conservative decision and not an independent decision. So I don’t understand why they want this.

I said earlier that I don’t think industry wanted this or asked for this; there’s no way to demonstrate it. When I asked them in committee, when I ask people at PDAC, when I talked to my colleagues and friends from the mining industry at PDAC—none of them seemed to be really interested or cared or knew why it was there or not. So it’s an odd thing to do, and I think it hurts us all as elected officials, because whenever things look like we’re doing things for what’s best for our party above what’s best for the people of Ontario, it is a bad look for all of us, no matter which side of the House you sit on. It’s a weakening.

As I said earlier, it’s a flawed bill. At second reading, I was clear about it; it’s really not terrible, but it’s flawed. The issues when it comes to Indigenous communities and the issues when it comes to the environment are things that are just a bridge too far in terms of support. It’s hard to measure the parts that are going to help. We would have been open to addressing those or fixing them through the amendments that we brought forward, but they voted against those amendments.

I want to speak briefly about tailings. I don’t think I heard you earlier. I apologize; I had to get something out of my office, so it may have been spoken about. Part of the bill does talk about tailings, and I want to talk about this because it is important. If you’re doing an aerial map—if you go to Google Maps, you can see some of the tailings ponds around Sudbury. Tailings are basically the waste rock. If you’re in mining, they bring muck to the surface. If you’re not from mining, you think of mud; the muck is actually big chunks of rock. Then, at the crushing plant, they literally crush this rock. There are a bunch of methods. The ones we use are ball mills and rod mills. Basically, the rock bounces against these big metal balls or rods, crushed into smaller and smaller fragments until it’s almost like a powder. There’s a lot of water that’s used in that and slowly and surely, through a variety of processes—I’ll just use flotation—the valuable stuff sinks and the waste floats off. You end up with a lot of waste sludge. It’s kind of gross to look at, to be honest. It’s muddy. It’s not disgusting; it’s just muddy. It’s not super clean. They pump this into tailings ponds.

For a long time, especially in Sudbury—we’ve been mining for a very long time—you build a dam and you build the dam bigger every year as the tailings ponds come. Some of the water will evaporate, but you always have this sludge that’s in there. Mining creates a lot of this sludge, tailings. For every tonne of metal—I have a stat here—you get between 20 and 200 tonnes of solid waste.

In the old days, they weren’t as good at refining. We’re still not great at it. There’s always some good product that gets into that sludge. But in the old days, there was gold in them there ponds. So I’m excited about the part of this that will move toward allowing some recovery from the tailings ponds.

Not only are tailings ponds a huge liability, but they take up a lot of space in nearby communities. When I was at the smelter, one of our major hazards when we did hazard assessments was that if the tailings pond broke, we could very likely explode the smelter because of the hot metal. Hot metal does not like being cooled down suddenly, and it will explode. Also, there was a community nearby that we more than likely would have buried in tailings. I don’t want anyone to be panicked, because Vale and Copper Cliff are world leaders when it comes to tailings ponds. They’ve invested close to $1 billion. They have a world-class facility when it comes to tailings. So I don’t want people to be overly concerned, because hazard assessment is what we do in the mining industry all the time.

But there have been tailings dam failures in the past. In 2019, there was one in Brazil that buried an entire town, just completely covered it. Think of an avalanche, but it’s water and mud. Speaker, 267 people were killed, and a lot of those people were never recovered. They’re just assumed to have been in that waste because they weren’t able to find them. That was in 2019.

Since then, there have been 18 major tailings dam failures—six last year alone. It’s a major liability around the world. Canada doesn’t have as many of them, but we did have one in BC, at Mount Polley mine. There were about 17 million cubic metres of water and eight million cubic metres of tailings and materials. There were no penalties for that spill, either. I’m not sure of the details, but I would assume that the taxpayers are helping to clean that up.

The tailings recovery—the point I’m trying to get to—I think is a win-win solution. It minimizes that risk, and we also get to process more of the minerals that have come up.

As we get deeper into the tailings pond, it’s going to be even more valuable. It’s going to be the easiest mining ever, honestly. Any mining company would love to have that rich a resource so close to the surface without having to go very, very far below the surface.

There are going to be ways for this to remove pollutants and to reduce the size of these ponds. It’s exciting because Dr. Mykytczuk from MIRARCO in Sudbury is doing this leading-edge research on this. This is groundbreaking work that they’re doing that will be in Ontario and—I’m sure the minister would agree with me—that we’ll be able to celebrate around the world. People will be banging on the doors to figure out how they’re doing this. It will be something we could celebrate and show off. I want to thank the minister because I know, during second reading, he made an announcement to invest in MIRARCO and the work that she was doing. So thank you very much, Minister, for doing that.

I want to go back to Eric. Eric Delparte is a friend of mine. We’ve been friends a long time. I was very happy that he came. I didn’t ask Eric, specifically, to come to speak, but I’m glad that he did.

I often say that Sudbury is a small town disguised as a city. You don’t know everybody, but you’ve seen everybody before. It’s difficult as a politician, because you recognize everybody, and then when I meet somebody, they often know who I am because I’m more visible as a politician. So you’ll meet somebody and not be sure if you’ve actually met them before. But it has a small-town feel. People care about each other, look out for each other. If you don’t know somebody and you’re passing them on the sidewalk, you have to say hello. That’s the small-town charm that it has there, and I love it, just like my friends from every riding love where they’re from.

When Eric said that it’s not just where we work, but it’s where we hunt and fish and play—I think that’s a core of this that we need to understand. It’s very important to have good-paying jobs, it’s very important to support industry that creates jobs, but we have to recognize that life is more than work. The Steelworkers, when they pushed hard for the eight-hour workday, and then they do shift work that works out to an eight-hour workday—one of the mottos they talked about really was eight hours of work, eight hours with family, and eight hours of sleep, so your life is more than work, your value is more than work. I think it’s important to emphasize that when miners come out of the underground—when I said earlier that the most important thing to come from out of the mine is the worker—they go see their families or they go together on trips.

When I was junior and I didn’t have that much seniority, most of my vacation time was fishing trips with the crew I worked with. We would get together because we would have a Tuesday off and nobody else is off on a Tuesday. Or we would have vacation time in the middle of the winter, so we would have vacation together. There’s a tight bond—and I’m including my supervisor. This wasn’t like an hourly-versus-staff thing; we all hung out. We worked together. We played together. Our value was more than our job. Our job is what allows us to pay for the things that we do the rest of the day.

So when I talk about the flaws in here, I really am talking about the importance of the community, the importance of the environment—and not just the community of the individual employees, but everyone who is there. When you’re so close that you say hi and nod and ask how people are doing that you haven’t met in a small community, that’s reflective of the values of that community and the values of mining companies, as I said earlier. This is why we can’t support the bill—it’s those small parts with the environment and that lack of helping have free, prior and informed consultation with First Nations.

Questions?

Thank you to the member for Sudbury for his participation this afternoon—a very important participation, having had a depth of experience in the mining sector that I’m sure not many of us have. I really appreciated hearing about his lived experience and some of the concerns and also the interesting personal perspectives from his community.

I’m wondering if he could speak a little bit more about the tailing ponds. That was something that was very interesting to me—some of the reclamation. I know in Niagara we’ve had different—they’re not, I guess, formal tailing ponds, but different deposits and different by-products of manufacturing from 100, 110, 120 years ago that are now beginning to be reclaimed as actually assets that were sort of sitting there for a long time and now are being reutilized. I’m wondering if he could speak a little bit about that process and what he sees coming down the pipe with regard to the future—

Speaking of good aspects of the bill, the Mining Act would increase certainty for business planning and generate investment in northern Ontario. It involves engagement with industry, Indigenous communities and Indigenous organizations on the proposed changes, and there are no proposed changes to our world-class environmental protections. Given these positive features, why is the opposition voting against this act, when members from the party, the official opposition, are clearly in favour of the industry and understand how important it is to the overall economic well-being of the province of Ontario and to Indigenous and northern communities?

My thanks this afternoon for being able to rise on behalf of the people of Niagara West and to participate in debate on Bill 71, the Building More Mines Act. I’m very thankful to be able to stand in this chamber today and build on the remarks that have already been added to the debate about this piece of legislation that I believe is critical and very important to the future prosperity of Ontario, the current prosperity of Ontario, and continuing a legacy in this province that we have now had for generations upon generations—far before I came here, and far before my family came here some 70 years ago.

First of all, I want to thank the Minister of Mines, the strong member for Timmins, for coming to this chamber with a piece of legislation that will be a legacy not just for him but for our entire Parliament, I believe, in what it will do for so many communities, not just in northern Ontario but, as was already spoken about extensively through the debate from my colleagues—especially the member for Essex county, who spoke about the important investments that the mining sector makes throughout the supply value-added chain, especially in the auto parts sector. I know that’s a crucial part of the economy in my neck of the woods, as well.

So I’m thankful to be able to speak today about that. I’m thankful to be able to participate.

I wish to welcome all those who are watching this afternoon and wish them the ability to follow us in what can be sometimes a complex file but one that I believe is very important.

I speak for many constituents in communities across Ontario in thanking the Minister of Mines for his leadership and his tireless work to further build up and improve the mining sector.

Thank you, Minister Pirie, for all of your efforts and your labour and for helping to bring economic prosperity to Ontario.

The minister’s advocacy for this bill and his presentation earlier today make it clear that there is an urgent need for the measures in this proposed legislation, and it’s why it’s my privilege to rise for the third reading and to expand on a few of the details from Bill 71, the Building More Mines Act.

Before I begin, I want to reiterate the minister’s point that our government has been actively engaged in the process of consulting with the public, with industry stakeholders and with Indigenous communities, as well as organizations from across Ontario on our proposed amendments to the Mining Act. We have also been consulting on further regulatory changes. As the minister mentioned, which I believe is very important for me to repeat, the measures in Bill 71 are based on the recommendations and the feedback from industry and other stakeholder experts. This is not an ivory tower exercise where we went and had some academics gathered together in a room, perhaps at the Mowat Block or another downtown office and come up with what ideas should be imposed upon the north, what ideas should be brought forward for this sector. This has been the consequence of a lot of listening, a lot of meaningful engagement to get the very best ideas from the sector to support a more modern, more streamlined legislative framework and regulatory regime for mineral exploration and development. We know that all of these industry partners and leaders brought forward their extensive knowledge and expertise together to provide recommendations that we’re using as a road map to help drive the industry forward, to reduce barriers to build more mines more efficiently.

These changes are needed to help seize the economic potential of the province’s minerals, to support the geopolitical need for secure access to these resources as outlined by the minister, and to advance the transition to a more sustainable economy.

Our proposed amendments mean to save companies time and money by reducing administrative burdens and clarifying requirements for rehabilitation and creating regulatory efficiencies.

Perhaps most importantly, these changes will help Ontario attract mining investments to support the unlocking of critical minerals, including those in the Ring of Fire region, while maintaining Ontario’s strong standards for environmental protection and meeting the duty to consult with Indigenous communities.

Before I highlight some of the key proposed changes in this legislation, I do want to speak briefly to the committee hearings on Bill 71. Our government values the importance of the feedback we receive. It’s why separate hearings were held to gather feedback on the bill in two of the province’s northern mining hubs: Timmins and Sudbury.

I also want to thank the government House leader for his work on ensuring that we have these active consultations, as well as the other members of the Standing Committee on the Interior.

Our government has acted. We have listened and then moved forward on the recommendations and questions of the various stakeholders and presenters throughout the committee process. In particular, we introduced an amendment through the committee stage that will support a balanced consideration of public health and safety, as well as the environment, for the permit to recover minerals from mining waste.

I’ll be elaborating more on this in a moment, but I want to ensure that all of us who are watching today know that your government has heard the importance of listening and ensuring that we are responding to the needs of the people in making this proposed legislation even stronger.

We will always support common sense measures that balance the need to build more mines efficiently with the corresponding need to uphold protections for the public, for safety and for the environment.

This balance is exactly what Bill 71 achieves, and it’s what our partners and our global allies expect. Ontario is known globally for its world-class environmental protections, and improving the Mining Act is crucial to support the transition to a greener economy.

As the minister touched on, this proposed legislation is a very important part of our Critical Minerals Strategy. This strategy supports better supply chain connections between industries, resources and workers in northern Ontario and manufacturing in southern Ontario, including Ontario-based electric vehicle and battery manufacturing—good news for so many communities in the south.

Jobs in the north lead to more jobs in the south, including important manufacturing jobs right in my home of Niagara. For example, the GM St. Catharines Propulsion Plant recently announced a transition to EV—electric vehicle—propulsion systems, securing hundreds of well-paying, secure jobs here in Niagara.

As an aside, it’s worth noting that we are attracting over $16 billion in transformational investments by global automakers; in fact, if I heard the numbers correctly, that number will soon be $22 billion. We are becoming a world leader in the supplying of EV batteries and battery materials to position Ontario as a leader in the EV supply chain.

Speaker, our Critical Minerals Strategy is helping to secure the province’s position as a reliable global supplier and processor of responsibly sourced critical minerals. The five-year road map that’s contained in the Critical Minerals Strategy focuses on six pillars, which I’d like to speak about and mention as they do set the stage and provide some context for our government’s investments and work thus far to advance that sector, including the initiatives in this legislation. The six pillars of the Critical Minerals Strategy are (1) to enhance geoscience information to support critical minerals exploration; (2) to grow domestic processing and create resilient local supply chains; (3) to improve Ontario’s regulatory framework; (4) to invest in critical minerals innovation, research and development; (5) to build economic development opportunities with Indigenous partners; (6) to grow the labour supply and develop a skilled labour force.

We heard the Minister of Mines speak about the importance of a major objective in Bill 71. That objective is to improve the Mining Act so that we can attract more investments and help secure the critical minerals that support this made-in-Ontario supply chain I know we all want. It’s why we’re bringing forward a suite of changes which will address current challenges and support a modern, robust and effective mining sector.

Ontarians have seen and witnessed project delays, increased costs and lost opportunities due to a lack of flexibility in closure planning and a lack of clarity within the Mining Act. We know that some processes and requirements can create uncertainty, which leads to a burdensome delay.

I want to reiterate the purpose of the Mining Act because it underscores and informs all of the changes that we’re proposing in this legislation. The purpose of the Mining Act is to encourage mineral exploration and development in a manner consistent with the recognition and affirmation of existing Aboriginal and treaty rights, including the crown’s duty to consult, and to minimize the impact of these activities on public health and safety and the environment.

With this overarching purpose in mind, I would like to go into a little bit more detail about some of the particulars of the amendments that we are proposing. If passed, the amendments made through this legislation would save time and money for companies and, ultimately, for workers, providing more jobs and more money for our communities.

Currently, one of the requirements to obtain a permit for mining is that the applicant must demonstrate that the condition of the lands on which the recovery would take place would be “improved” with respect to public health, safety, and the environment after the recovery and remediation activities. The proposed amendments in this bill would replace the requirement to “improve the land” subject to the recovery permit with a requirement that the condition of the land be “comparable to or better than it was before the recovery activity.” This would provide greater flexibility for recovery permit applicants. The term “improvement” is ambiguous and creates uncertainty about the degree of improvement needed. What does that even mean? How much improvement is requisite under the act? This clarification will act as an incentive to ensure that companies who are participating in this worthwhile activity can make use of previously existing materials and have greater clarity.

I would also like to note that our government did bring forward a motion to amend section 18 of the bill to further strengthen the language around the requirements for the condition of land following recovery activities. During public hearings of the Standing Committee on the Interior, a number of stakeholders and presenters shared concerns regarding the consistency of the language in this subsection of the bill as it relates to the intended purpose and the conditions of the mineral recovery permit.

Speaker, as always, our government listened. We’ve heard these concerns, and we’ve acted. Throughout the legislative process, we’ve been open to feedback from stakeholders and partners, and we remain committed to strengthening the language in this bill to ensure the legislation reflects the goals we all share: improving the Mining Act, supporting the sector and, fundamentally, supporting local communities. Our proposed amendments to the current language in the legislation address the concerns that were raised and support a balanced consideration of public health and safety, as well as the environment, for the recovery of minerals permitted. Our proposed language ensures that remediation of the land with respect to public health and safety, as well as the environment, would be carried out to a comparable standard or better than it was before the recovery of minerals took place. This amendment would still maintain our commitment to flexibility and our objective in this section of the act to ensure that there is greater flexibility for recovery permit applicants, but also ensure that all of—not any of—public health and safety and the environment would be remediated to a comparable standard or better.

We know that these proposed improvements to the Mining Act are crucial to supporting the sector and the transition to a cleaner, greener economy. This motion to amend demonstrates that we are always going to uphold Ontario’s world-class standards for environmental protection and public health and safety in the mineral development sector.

Before I continue, I’d like to point out that companies in Ontario are already making use of this tactic to retrieve critical minerals from mine waste, which contributes to advancing the circular economy within the mining industry.

For example, we heard recently that Vale Canada is moving to accelerate commercial recovery of critical minerals from mine waste in partnership with the Mining Innovation, Rehabilitation, and Applied Research Corp. at Cambrian College. According to the company’s news release, “The industrial research chair program ... will develop, pilot and work towards commercializing bioleaching and bioremediation processes including efforts to recover nickel and cobalt from ... tailings and other wastes.” I appreciated hearing more from the member for Sudbury about the important advancements that are being made in this technology. Our government is supporting this groundbreaking project. We’re contributing through the Critical Minerals Innovation Fund, which Minister Pirie outlined in his remarks, as well as contributing through the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corp. To quote the Minister of Northern Development and Indigenous Affairs, the member for Kenora–Rainy River and the chair of the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corp.: “The ... Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corp. is supporting innovative solutions in the resource extraction sector that will change the way we see mining. By partnering with Vale,” MIRARCO and Cambrian College, “we are committing to made-in-Ontario solutions that will reduce mine waste and enhance value for materials already involved in the mining process.”

Our government’s support of this type of innovation to recover critical minerals from mine waste demonstrates our steadfast commitment to helping to move the industry forward in an environmentally sustainable way. This program is just one example.

Our proposed amendments would also simplify and improve closure plans by strengthening qualified professionals’ certification of plans and allowing companies to conditionally file a closure plan while deferring certain elements to a later-approved date. A conditional filing order would be issued by the minister on request from a proponent and may include terms and conditions for those elements as determined by the minister.

We are also proposing to eliminate the need for proponents to file a notice of material change for minor site alterations, which will help to alleviate unnecessary burdens.

There are more changes, changes to allow more flexibility in the techniques used to rehabilitate mines once they’re closed while continuing to uphold Ontario’s world-class environmental protection standards; our proposed changes to remove administrative burdens, to simplify processes with respect to closure plans and address ongoing concerns we’ve heard from this industry for years, including at public hearings before the committee. We know that we have to make these changes, because current processes are creating uncertainty, resulting in long delays, cost overruns and lost opportunities for mining proponents. We know that better is possible, and with this legislation, we are accomplishing that.

I do want to speak very briefly in the minutes I have left about those closure plans, because I think that’s something perhaps not everyone is aware of in what is entailed within the closure plan process. The Mining Act requires that mining companies have a filed closure plan before starting advanced exploration or mine production. A closure plan describes the measures that the proponent will take during the life cycle of the mine to rehabilitate the mine site.

There is currently no flexibility within the Mining Act to allow for a closure plan to be filed without all of the required materials, regardless of what features will be built or brought online during the life of the mine’s operations. Closure plans are supposed to be conceptual, forward-thinking plans for how to close out and rehabilitate a mine. It’s not always practical to provide information for features that, frankly, may never be built and for rehabilitation measures which can’t be predicted, let alone which innovative future technologies could be used. This is why we’re proposing measures to provide mining proponents with more flexibility.

Currently, the term “rehabilitate” in the Mining Act means to take measures so that the use or condition of the site is restored to its former use or condition, or is made suitable for a use that the ministry sees fit. We’re amending the definition of “rehabilitate” as well as the related definitions of “protective measures” to allow an alternate use or condition or feature to remain on the site post-closure. This, again, will provide greater flexibility and certainty to industry by allowing alternate post-closure land uses and rehabilitation measures while simultaneously upholding our environmental standards.

We’ve said it before, and I believe it bears repeating in this chamber: When issuing authorizations under the Mining Act, where those authorizations have the potential to trigger a duty to consult, Ontario will always assess and reassess the potential impacts to Aboriginal and treaty rights and remains committed to meeting its constitutional obligations, including the duty to consult with Indigenous peoples.

These proposed changes would also create more options for companies to pay financial assurance. Instead of paying financial assurance up front, it could be paid in phases tied to the project’s construction schedule. Currently, companies have to provide the government with financial assurance, the estimated cost of the rehabilitation measures described in the closure plan. This allows the province access to the money to carry out rehab work outlined in the plan. But the up-front cost can be sometimes unnecessary as proposed changes or proposed features may never be built, and associated rehab costs never materialize. Amending the Mining Act would update this process to allow proponents to submit financial assurances in a more reasonable timeline.

Speaker, I do see that I’m running close to the conclusion of my comments this afternoon. I just want to wish again, to all members of this Legislature, to remind them of the importance of this legislation and thank the Minister of Mines for taking the leadership that was need-ed to ensure that we have a strong mining sector, as we have had for generations in the past, for generations to come. Thank you so very much for listening to me this afternoon.

Questions?

Further debate?

Madam Speaker, Ontario has seen literally billions of dollars of automotive manufacturing investment as a result of the efforts made by this government, and one of those multi-billion dollar investments is from Volkswagen, in the city of St. Thomas. I’d like to hear from the member for Sudbury, why would he want to jeopardize that multi-billion dollar investment by wanting to stop the development of more mines in Ontario?

To the member from Sudbury: Thank you for your presentation. I always learn so much listening to you, especially on the subject of mining.

As part of the deregulation amendments that government Bill 71 contains—I recognize that there are some measures in there that certainly weaken the environmental protections, but there are also measures in there that release companies from financial obligations. One of them is, of course, the rehabilitation of the mines once the extraction is done. There seems to be not a lot of information in here—and perhaps it’s coming in the regulations—on who will pay. You’ve touched upon it that the taxpayer will most likely end up picking up the bill if the mining companies are released, but is there anyone else who could pay besides the taxpayer? Is there someone else you think the government has in mind who will pick up the bill besides the mining company?

This is a good aspect of the bill. I mentioned earlier complimenting the minister about the funding for Dr. Mykytczuk’s work from MIRARCO. Basically, to shorten it—when you mine, there’s a by-product, there’s a sludge, and there are valuable materials and also pollutants that are there. She has explained the process to me, and I usually end it by saying, “Exactly.” That’s why she has a PhD and I don’t. The process, basically, will use, I think, biological leaching to extract these and also capture some of the pollutants. It’s a way that we can shrink the liability of the tailings pond but also allow mining organizations to be profitable for stuff that they already brought to surface, and be able to mine that and process that in the future. So it’s a win-win for the environment, the community and the mining company.

I’m going to be fair to people: Our journey and knowledge when it comes to Indigenous communities, First Nations communities in Canada, I think for most of us of a certain age, has been stilted. You only know what you know. But we’re at the point now where we need to know more, and we know that we need to know more, and so we can’t pretend anymore—any of us—that we didn’t know any better.

I don’t understand why the bill didn’t have the consultation. I don’t know why we’re not moving towards free, prior and informed consultation. I don’t know why, when mining companies are asking for a framework, the Conservative government isn’t making that commitment to build the framework so mining companies can be more successful with this process. We really are in a stage where we should be doing this, and it makes perfect sense to me.

So I think it’s a great question and something we should be moving forward on.

The other thing is, you can say that there’s a good relationship with Indigenous communities, but there isn’t—there is for some mining companies who have worked individually to build a nation-to-nation agreement, nation-to-nation relationships, but the Conservative government hasn’t done a good job first-hand on this. If they had, we wouldn’t have chiefs saying, “You have to drag dead bodies off the roads to develop through my land.” This isn’t something that chiefs do off the hop; that is something they do when they’re being ignored. We’re urging them to build this relationship that the rest of the mining communities are asking for, have established, but the Conservative government has to be here and be an asset for mining companies when it comes to nation-to-nation relationships with First Nations.

There are some good aspects to the bill. Just to clarify, they’re changing the surety so you don’t have to pay for the whole project up front; you can do it in stages. So before you start the first stage, you have to have the money up front, and before you start the second stage, you have to have the money up front for the second stage—and the third stage. I think that’s a good part of this bill.

The part I’m concerned about is, when you change the aspects of leaving the land at the end of the day “better than” and you weaken that, it allows lawyers to get involved and arguments to happen.

I think, as well, that if you don’t have a good structure in place when things fall through, the public pays through taxes, and taxpayers have to pay for it. This is what we saw in the past with it, and I lived this in my own community. We’ve seen this with other abandoned mine sites, where the community, the taxpayers through all of Ontario have to pay for it.

So we want to make sure we’re not weakening those laws. Those laws were written for specific reasons and to insure them.

So there is some good, but there is some bad.

I’m very glad that Volkswagen chose to invest in Ontario. I met with auto companies during my first term, in 2018-19. I don’t want to say which auto company it was—not Volkswagen, but one of the other large auto companies—that said, “You need to speak to the government. What I need as an international company when I go and say to invest in Ontario is—I need to tell them we have more than a sign at the border that says, ‘Open for business.’ I need to know what that means and what to spell out.” And the government wasn’t able to do that for four years. So I’m glad they’re able to attract. I’m glad that Volkswagen chose Ontario. We have a lot to offer.

One of the things we have to offer that’s being jeopardized today is—we have a universal medicaid system that has been weakened. That’s what makes us more attractive than the States for these companies to invest in—but as we get towards the American medicaid system, we’re not going to be as competitive, and we’re going to lose those jobs.

Questions?

Thank you. Of course, under this legislation, we understand the importance of having that assurance, but we also recognize that, in many cases, having the complete financial assurance cost up front is unnecessary because we don’t know what particular proposed features would never be built and which associated rehabilitation costs would never materialize. You’re placing a greater capital requirement on the proponent for costs that may never actually end up materializing.

This does allow for assurance. We obviously still want to ensure that the funds are available to provide for the rehabilitation project, but it will be paid in phases tied to the project’s construction schedule to create more options for companies to pay financial assurance. We obviously want to ensure that the funds are available, but we recognize that perhaps, as the situation evolves, we’re going to have different requirements, so to have that done in a series of payments as opposed to a one-time, up-front lump sum is about providing that flexibility and additionally ensuring that the funds are available to make the investments that are needed.

We have a lot of questions around this bill, because part of it—they’re eliminating the director of mine rehabilitation, and replacing them with the minister to have sole discretion in some of these functions.

Then there’s also the question around the number of changes to the act that loosen rules around what financial assurances will be required after these changes become law. The financial assurances in the act are essentially a surety that the miner or the company has the necessary funds to remediate the site upon closure.

When a mine comes in, does its business and then leaves, the community is left with those residual environmental issues. Why is this government loosening up those sureties where mining companies are guaranteeing the remediation of that property, the land?

My question for the member for Niagara West: The legacy of the Liberal government for the years 2003 to 2018 was to ignore the mining sector and refuse to enable Ontario to become a supplier of critical minerals and a manufacturing hub for electric vehicles. The NDP supported the Liberals for three of those 15 years. I guess they must believe that we need to purchase minerals from China or Russia, and I don’t know how they would expect us to be ready to build electric vehicles with these critical minerals. How does that contrast with this proposed legislation in terms of prosperity and electric vehicle production?

Questions?

I really appreciated the member from Sudbury speaking with poise and experience—direct experience—and even nostalgia, especially about the camaraderie and the fellowship of good-paying jobs, those opportunities that he had—careers, like you said, the member from Niagara West. But there are a lot of blurred lines in among some of the other dialogue.

I’d like the member from Niagara West to please explain a very quick summary and overview of what the actual changes are—what we’re proposing—and what they hope to achieve.

I want to thank the member from Niagara West for his speech. I know last fall I had the pleasure of visiting the member and speaking to many members of the supply chain in the Niagara region, and I know that, like my community, Niagara West has a supply chain industry that is part of a very competitive economy, and Ontario does need to be competitive with other jurisdictions.

I’m wondering if the member could describe to me what the changes to the act or this act will do to ensure that Ontario is the number one jurisdiction for mining globally.

Well, Ontario already is the number one destination for mining globally, but we know that there’s always more that can be done. We’re not content to sit there and rest on our laurels. I know that the minister has demonstrated through his active engagement with this sector the necessity of recognizing how all these pieces fit together. We know, at the end of the day, it’s not enough simply to be hewers of wood and drawers of water, as the proverbial Canadian archetype might seem; we really need to ensure that we have value-added processing here in Ontario, and I know in Niagara West, with a broad diversity of economic opportunities that exist, seeing the Critical Minerals Strategy as tied in with our local auto parts manufacturing sector is really part and parcel of creating an integrated supply chain from end to end that provides for well-paying, secure jobs—careers, in fact. I don’t know if even you just want to call them jobs because these are really careers for so many men and women who are able to put food on the table, pay their mortgage, ensure that they have a better life for them and their children as a result of having this supply chain right here in Ontario.

We’ve said it before and it bears repeating: When issuing authorizations under this legislation, the Mining Act, where those authorizations have the potential to trigger the duty to consult, I know that Ontario will always assess and reassess the potential impacts to Aboriginal and treaty rights, and will remain committed to meeting its constitutional and other obligations, ensuring that we’re treating the Indigenous peoples of this land with the dignity and respect that they deserve and ensuring that the continued commitment to consultation with all partners is part of the very DNA of this government.

—approve mines faster by eliminating duplication, providing operational flexibility and reducing costs;

—advance critical minerals permits by making it easier for companies to get a permit to recover minerals from mine tailings and waste;

—improve closure planning by having more qualified professionals available to certify plans and allow companies to conditionally file a closure plan;

—allow more flexibility in techniques used to rehabilitate mines once they’re closed;

—create more options for companies to pay financial assurance—instead of paying financial assurance up front, it could be paid in phases tied to the project’s construction schedule.

All of this is to ensure that we have good jobs, good careers, money to put food on the table, pay mortgages and ensure that we’re building up our communities.

I can speak more broadly to the importance of consultation and partnership that I know the Minister of Mines has demonstrated and I know all of my colleagues, regardless of their consultation. I know for myself, working in the Ministry of Red Tape Reduction, one of the key pieces of the role I’ve been blessed with is reaching out to people who might not otherwise have the opportunity to come into downtown Toronto, to go into the ivory tower or the bureaucracy or the academia to make their recommendations, but to go out into community and get their feedback on the ground about what the processes are in place that are perhaps creating roadblocks or barriers or challenges to being able to make the investments that are needed for our communities.

So, you know what? I know there’s a lot of different avenues that participants provide their feedback through. I’m happy to go take a peek and see what we can come up with as it pertains to the particular section and then get back to her.