Ford government has one set of rules for their friends; another for everyone else

QUEEN’S PARK – Earlier this morning, the Premier’s office shared a statement with media regarding two Greenbelt properties that the developer put up for sale in Ajax. Ford’s statement noted that developers were “on notice” and that any land not being used by developers for housing will be put back into the Greenbelt.

Marit Stiles, Leader of the Official Opposition NDP, issued the following statement:

“Ford’s Conservatives are changing their tune simply because they got caught. Clearly, this is a government that has one set of rules for those with close connections to their party and a different set for everyone else. None of this is about housing. This government needs to recall the Legislature so we can restore all of these lands to Greenbelt protection now, and Ford needs to fire Minister Clark from Cabinet.”

QUICK FACTS:

• This is not the first time a developer has used the Ford government’s “housing tools” for speculation and profit.
• In fact, a close contact of the Premier recently made windfall profits after getting special zoning orders to build on farmland with a strip of the Greenbelt running through it.
• This developer, Shakir Rehmatullah of Flato Developers, was on the guest list for the Ford family wedding and is closely connected with the Premier’s former right-hand-man Amin Massoudi.
• Yet, the government gave little to no response when that sale was made public by the Toronto Star.
• Earlier this year, prolific donor and another close contact of the Conservative Party, Silvio De Gasperis, who owns the historic Dominion Foundry Site, received an MZO to begin demolition of the site only to turn it into a parking lot.
• This closely connected developer continues to make profit while new housing is still nowhere to be seen, despite this government insisting that the MZO was issued to increase housing supply.