Ottawa tabling bill to skirt impact assessment law for ‘national interest’ projects

By Nick Murray The federal government is developing a “national interest” bill to fast-track nation-building projects with a streamlined regulatory approval process as a substitute for reviews under the Impact Assessment Act. A briefing document obtained by The Canadian Press indicates the legislation would lay out the criteria to decide if a project is in the national interest. Once that’s decided, a single federal minister would be named to oversee a review process laying out how the project can be built. The document, dated May 23, was prepared for consultations between the Privy Council Office, or PCO, and provinces, territories, and Indigenous partners on the government’s major projects strategy. PCO officials met with those partners as recently as Wednesday night to go over the proposal. It’s expected to be a…

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