Environmental groups say they'll sue if governments don't strengthen protections for Ontario's threatened caribou population.
Ottawa and the province have created a draft conservation <a href="https://ero.ontario.ca/notice/019-4995" target="_blank" rel="noopener">agreement</a> to ostensibly protect boreal caribou — an "indicator species" critical to forests' biodiversity.
The population is <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/caribou-boreal-population" target="_blank" rel="noopener">threatened</a>, which means the species will likely become endangered if steps aren't taken to protect it. The agreement came about because of Ontario's failure to do just that.
Under Canada's <a href="https://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/S-15.3/page-5.html#docCont" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Species At Risk Act</a> (SARA), the federal government must step in if it feels a province isn't adequately protecting "critical habitat." Then-environment minister Jonathan Wilkinson warned Ontario in March of last year that it was in breach of SARA (<a href="https://www.auditor.on.ca/en/content/annualreports/arreports/en21/ENV_ProtectingSpecies_en21.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">page 3</a>) after the Ford government exempted logging companies from the Endangered Species Act.
Ottawa can issue an order to comply under SARA, but the feds have said their preference is to work with the Ford government on a solution (<a href="https://www.auditor.on.ca/en/content/annualreports/arreports/en21/ENV_ProtectingSpecies_en21.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">page 65</a>) — and that's what they've done.
The result is a draft agreement that focuses on data gathering and monitoring over the next five years. While the agreement acknowledges that the caribou "require large, undisturbed areas of old conifer upland forest and lowlands," it contains no commitments to actually protect any of that habitat.
On "protected areas," the agreement reads: "Years 3-5: If/where opportunities are identified, initiate action to implement them."
Ecojustice lawyer Joshua Ginsberg called it "a plan to make a plan." He and others argue the agreement allows the logging and mining industries to operate unchallenged and doesn't meet the feds' responsibility to step up under SARA. The agreement needs to include a hard commitment to protect at least 65 per cent of the caribou's habitat — the minimum amount set out in SARA to ensure critical species can survive, he said.
"So all we're asking, really, is for Ontario and Canada to agree to do the bare minimum. And this agreement doesn't even come close," he said.
If the agreement isn't beefed up, Ecojustice, on behalf of Wildlands League, Ontario Nature and the David Suzuki Foundation, is prepared to sue, Ginsberg said.
"This agreement is below the standards set out in the federal Act, and if it proceeds unchanged, we intend to take any steps to remedy that situation — any necessary legal steps," he said, adding that although the legal target would be the federal government, the fault lies with Ontario.
It's a precedent-setting moment, he said. If the governments enshrine Ontario's inaction as good enough to meet Species At Risk Act requirements, more threatened and endangered animals will be imperilled, he said.
"If this is the standard that the federal government and provincial governments are held to ... then that obligation is not worth the paper it's written on," he said.
Historically, boreal caribou habitat lived across most of northern Ontario. But <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/caribou-boreal-population" target="_blank" rel="noopener">40 to 50 per cent</a> of that habitat has been lost since the 1800s due to human activity, meaning populations have had to retreat northward. Ontario has an estimated 5,000 boreal caribou remaining.
Environmental activists and the provincial auditor general have long said Ontario <a href="https://www.qpbriefing.com/2021/10/22/ontario-greenwashing-forestry-sector-in-new-report-advocates-say/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">isn't meeting its environmental responsibilities</a>.
The auditor general <a href="https://www.auditor.on.ca/en/content/annualreports/arreports/en21/ENV_ProtectingSpecies_en21.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">noted</a> the Ford government's exemption of the logging industry from the Endangered Species Act would cause harm to the caribou population and other at-risk species. The AG also found the Environment Ministry under the Progressive Conservatives consistently <a href="https://www.qpbriefing.com/2021/11/22/environment-ministry-failing-to-uphold-its-standards-ag/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">rubber stamps projects that may harm species at risk</a>, and that "staff have no direction on when to reject applications that would do harm."
The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society <a href="https://cpawsbc.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/CPAWS-2021-Report-Card.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">has said</a> the government has "demonstrated little or no commitment" to protecting more of its land base, in addition to "serious harmful anti-conservation action, including rolling back nature protection policies and legislation and proposing the delisting of protected areas."
Activists said the issue far precedes the PCs.
"It’s been more than two decades of ‘planning to plan’ for caribou in Ontario, rather than simply protecting critical caribou habitat," Ontario Nature's Julee Boan said "Instead, the government of Ontario is using public funds to subsidize logging roads that carve up the remaining habitat. I’m concerned the federal government is about to go down the same path.”
Ontario's conservation agreement would be the weakest in Canada, Ginsberg said, noting that other provinces including Alberta have signed agreements with Ottawa that at least commit to planning toward specific scientific habitat protection targets.
"This doesn't even do that," he said.
The conservation agreement is open for comment on Ontario’s Environmental Registry until March 21.

Environmental groups prepare to sue if caribou protections aren’t beefed up

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