Greenbelt saga weakening support for Ford & Ontario PCs, 2 polls suggest | News
Summary
The Abacus Data poll, conducted over a week starting Aug. 29 and released Tuesday, found the PC party with the support of 34 per cent of committed voters, down seven points from the firms previous Ontario politics survey in mid-July. After vowing throughout his first term in office that he wouldnt touch the Greenbelt, Ford reversed course last November and announced the government was lifting environmental protections on land at 15 hand-picked sites to allow the construction of 50,000 homes. Last month, Ontario Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk found developers heavily influenced the selection of those sites, and estimated that the governments move boosted the value of the lands by at least $8.3 billion. Wake said it all led to Fords cabinet making what he called "an uninformed and opaque decision which resulted in the creation of an opportunity to further the private interests of some developers improperly." Both reports showed that developers, their lawyers or their lobbyists were in contact during September and October of 2022 with the chief of staff to then-minister Steve Clark about their Greenbelt properties, well before the government made any public announcements about its plans.