Speaking days after an explosive auditor general report, Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy argued that Ontarians appreciate his government's fiscal prudence and pro-builder stance, even as the Greenbelt controversy threatened to overshadow Monday's economic update.
"I didn't say nobody cares," he added when pressed. "What I did say is that we're going to continue our focus to make sure that we do our responsibility to make sure the infrastructure is there." As Green Leader Mike Schreiner noted in a press release shortly after Bethlenfalvy's presser, the formerly protected land did not need to be removed for Ontario to meet its housing targets.
But some mayors and councils in the region have been advocating for those lands to be developed for "decades," he said.Shortly after Bethlenfalvy's presser, the premier's office released to media a memo sent to all chiefs of staff and deputy ministers announcing a working group had been formed to implement 14 of the 15 recommendations from the auditor general report, and reminding them to follow cabinet submission and conflict-of-interest processes in the meantime.
The finance minister spoke from the same playbook that Ford and Clark used last week, which boils down to two parts. The admission: the process for selecting lands to be removed from the Greenbelt could've been better. The justification: there are a lot of people coming to Ontario and they need places to live.
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