Ford and Bill 5's "Special Economic Zones" Bring Worst US-Style Labour Practices to Our Province, Warns CUPE Ontario

National Post

09-05-2025

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– 'No one voted to turn Huntsville, Ontario, into Huntsville, Alabama' –
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TORONTO — Imagine going to work in a town or city where, by government decree, workers had no right to health and safety, a minimum wage, or employment protections, including the right to recourse when they were injured, fired or mistreated on the job.
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That's the reality bearing down on Ontarians once the Ford Conservatives' Bill 5, Protect Ontario by Unleashing our Economy Act, 2025, is made law.
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Buried in Schedule 9 of this omnibus bill, now at second reading in the Ontario legislature, is the wide-ranging power to create 'special economic zones' anywhere in the province. Within these zones, the provincial government can suspend or override all existing laws and regulations around labour conditions, health and safety, and environmental protections, as well as municipal regulations.
'The effects on workers, families and communities will be disastrous,' said CUPE Ontario President Fred Hahn.
Under Bill 5, the Ford Conservatives could turn entire cities – like Toronto or Windsor or Sudbury – into special economic zones. Any region could be named one in which fundamental labour rights and protections no longer apply, including those around child labour, the right to refuse unsafe work, and even basic meal breaks.
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'Existing Ontario labour law won't apply in these special economic zones. Under the cloak of an impending economic crisis and the guise of fighting tariffs, Doug Ford plans on delivering workers to the wild west of working conditions, all to the benefit of big business,' said Hahn.
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Concerned groups have already pointed out the risks Bill 5 poses to the environment, biodiversity, and indigenous sovereignty; the Canadian Civil Liberties Association has called it a 'power grab.' As the largest union in Ontario, CUPE Ontario is sounding the alarm about the bill's threat to workers' rights and the alarming history of flagrant labour violations in special economic zones in the US and around the world.
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'The Ford Conservatives are not letting a crisis go to waste,' warned Hahn. 'We're in a climate of deep uncertainty and we are all worried about our future, so few are paying any attention to what the newly re-elected Conservatives are actually doing at Queen's Park.'
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The threats from tariffs and their fallout are real, Hahn pointed out, 'but you don't solve one problem by creating dozens of others. The potential for labour violations is enormous. No one voted for Doug Ford to turn Huntsville, Ontario, into Huntsville, Alabama.'
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He continued: 'Doug Ford won the election by wrapping himself in the flag, naming himself Captain Canada, and claiming he'd defend Ontario workers and Ontario jobs. Now he's using the tariff wars as camouflage to create the conditions in which corporate greed can flourish unchecked and without fundamental protections like labour rights. You can't fight for Canada by bringing in laws that copy the very worst of the US laws.'
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'Ford has adopted the tactics of the most right-wing Republican demagogues. Canada is not and never will be the fifty-first state – and labour and environmental rights are part of what defines us as distinct from the US. These are rights to be strengthened and protected, not disregarded and suspended.'
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