Ontario Premier Doug Ford is ready to carry a information convention Thursday, the place it’s anticipated he’ll element new laws geared toward dismantling homeless encampments and clamping down on public drug use.
Ford is scheduled to talk at 10 a.m. ET at Queen’s Park. His workplace says he’ll be joined by a number of cupboard ministers, together with the minister of well being, minister of municipal affairs and housing, the lawyer and solicitor generals, and the affiliate minister of psychological well being and addictions.
You’ll be able to watch the announcement stay within the participant above.
In a letter to more than dozen mayors last week, Ford mentioned robust new laws would offer municipalities with instruments and extra funding to clear homeless encampments. He additionally mentioned police could be given extra authority to implement a prohibition on public drug use and stiffer penalties for many who “intentionally and regularly break the regulation.”
Ford additionally mentioned he was keen to make use of the controversial legislative software generally known as the however clause to override the Canadian Constitution of Rights and Freedoms “ought to the courts intrude” in municipalities utilizing the brand new provisions.
Ford’s letter got here in response to a public request from the same group of mayors to strengthen involuntary habit remedy legal guidelines and have the province turn into an intervener in court docket instances the place municipalities need to clear encampments.
In addition they requested for sure legal guidelines to be strengthened to permit for arrests and jail time for many who repeatedly trespass.
Whereas some mayors welcomed Ford’s promise to make use of the however clause if courts attempt to strike down elements of the laws, others — such because the mayors of Toronto and Hamilton — have publicly opposed the measure.
Homelessness and encampments have risen dramatically underneath Ford’s time period, with tent cities popping up in municipalities small and huge all through Ontario. The Affiliation of Municipalities of Ontario says there have been 1,400 encampments across the province in 2023.
Shelters all through the province are full, with some 12,000 folks in Toronto’s shelter system alone.
Opposition events at Queen’s Park have accused Ford and his authorities of failing to construct new housing and aiding municipalities in increasing shelter house.
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