Chimney swifts, a threatened bird, lost provincial protection after Ontario replaced its Endangered Species Act with weaker legislation.
Photo: Curtis Parypa / The Narwhal
“Our jobs were changing quickly from being biologists and scientific experts to being administrative staff.”
That’s what a former expert who worked at Ontario’s Ministry of Environment, whom The Narwhal is not naming, told me this summer. They used to be a part of a team in charge of protecting the province’s most vulnerable species, which changed drastically with the Ford government’s decision to kill the Endangered Species Act. The new, much weaker rules put developers in charge of assessing potential impacts of their projects on endangered species. Once submitted, plans are automatically accepted and greenlit.
Fewer protections for endangered species is the obvious result of the switch. But there was a lesser-known internal impact, the former ministry staffer said: the handcuffing of government scientists trying to do anything about it. The new law forced them to become rubber stamps for industries they once held to account.
So reporter Leah Borts-Kuperman and I spent two months reaching out to sources, building trust and digging deep, looking through LinkedIn and the archives of the government’s public directory. We counted more than a dozen people who’ve left the team since last February. And we spoke to five people with knowledge of the exodus.
“Our jobs stopped feeling meaningful,” another official told me confidentially.
Unsurprisingly, none wanted to be named, for fear of professional consequences. Instead, we’ve had hushed conversations and exchanged messages over encrypted apps. (We have a note embedded in the investigation on how we handle unnamed sources.)
I’ve been hearing rumours since 2019 about how the Ministry of Environment has been sidelined by the Doug Ford government. As the government drastically changed policy after policy — conservation authorities, environmental assessments, electric vehicles, the list goes on and on and on — I kept hearing from officials who said their work is eroding, without their input or approval.
As governments remake laws and fight over what to name the natural world (ahem: Lake Ontario), it is the people who protect the natural world that are hit first and hardest. We don’t always think of them; we’re so focused on the visible harms to the green spaces, lakes and animals we see every day, rightfully so. But if they can’t do their jobs properly — or aren’t allowed to — the natural world falls to the mercy of policies unmoored from evidence, which can spell catastrophe.
As pledges of sovereignty and economic growth shape policies that affect the province, and the country, we’ll keep watch over the protections, and the protectors, of the natural world. For now, go read the investigation, which offers a glimpse into Ontario’s endangered species office, over here.
Take care and ask an expert,
Fatima Syed
Ontario reporter
P.S. Handcuffing experts can cause reverberations beyond the halls of power — to people, places and species across the country. It’s why my fellow reporters and I spend months on end investigating stories that governments might prefer you didn’t read. But we can’t do it alone. Support our journalism by paying what you can today, and help keep it free for everyone.
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To that end, we’re hiring our first director of philanthropy, who will lead The Narwhal’s revenue strategy and fundraising operations. We’re also seeking a development coordinator, who will offer critical support across the organization’s audience and fundraising efforts.
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