The federal government has, since the election of Mark Carney as Prime Minister in 2025, moved with unprecedented speed to weaken or remove regulations, seen as obstructing its economic objectives. In Carney’s words, “Canada has too much regulation and not enough action.”
Garnering less attention, the federal government has been concentrating legislative and regulatory powers within the executive branch, sidelining the legislative branch’s role in holding the executive branch accountable for its actions.
Regulations are a critical function of government. They interpret, implement, and enforce government laws and policies largely away from public scrutiny. They are also essential for business providing guidance and certainty, regarding democratic values and economic plans going forward. The number of regulatory agencies is extensive, covering, health, food, drugs, energy, finance, transportation, workplace health and safety, environment, and more.
According to the government’s Cabinet Directive on Regulation , their primary purpose is to advance the public interest including protecting citizens’ health, safety, security, social and economic well-being, and the environment. Their purpose, as stated, is also to support a fair and competitive economy that benefits Canadians and Canadian businesses.
The tension between these goals, under the current corporate-government power relationship has often compromised the public interest in favour of corporate interests (profits and shareholder value).
The government’s accelerating deregulation agenda
Bill C-5 introduced in June 2025—entitled an Act to enact the Free Trade and Labour Mobility in Canada Act and the Building Canada Act— gave the cabinet the ability to prioritize and fast track major projects including scrapping regulations it views as red tape.
Four months later, The Budget Implementation Act (Bill C-15), gave cabinet ministers the power to effectively exempt any individual or company from virtually any federal law or regulation under their responsibility except for the criminal code.
Budget 2025 also outlined plans to reduce federal spending by $60 billion over the next five years—eliminating an estimated 40,000 positions in the public service by 2028-29, roughly 10 per cent of the total workforce. This will undoubtedly include cuts to regulatory agencies, including staff that design, implement, oversee, and enforce regulations.
If history is any guide, “eliminating red tape” (that is, deregulation) is invariably accompanied by fiscal austerity—including cuts to regulatory agencies, notably staff who propose, monitor, and enforce regulations. Gutting regulatory resources is replaced by corporate self-regulation.
Acceleration of Major Project approvals
On May 8, the government announced further changes to the regulatory architecture to accelerate the deregulation process and speed up and broaden major project approvals deemed to be in the national interest.
It released two discussion papers , Getting Major Projects Built and Strengthening One Economy Through Trade and Transportation, detailing its planned changes to regulations and legislation, which will be implemented after a 30-day consultation period with the public, organizations, etc. The consultations are largely rubber stamps for what the government plans to implement.
The cabinet will be granted power to pre-approve projects in “federal economic zones,”—namely, transportation corridors, telecommunications networks, energy production and transmission infrastructure including pipelines, and industrial regions—thereby removing the need for separate project reviews and exempt projects from requiring individual environmental reviews.
The cabinet will, as needed, exempt projects from requiring individual reviews not withstanding environmental impacts and risks to public health and safety. It will also be able to grant exceptions to rules governing fossil fuel and nuclear oversight, habitat preservation, and laws which protect species at risk of extinction.
Ironically, the law coincided with a Canadian teenager’s filing of a submission to the CUSMA Secretariat asserting that Canada is failing to effectively enforce its environmental laws with respect to the protection of migratory birds and species at risk by allowing the release of harmful substances into the environment beyond the legally permitted limits.
Cabinet would also have the power to declare major pipelines “in the public interest,” before the energy regulator is required to complete its review of the project’s conditions or location of the pipe.
Proposed changes to major project development rules risk trampling on the rights of First Nations. According to the Assembly of First Nation Chiefs President, there hasn’t been enough consultation with First Nations on major projects to date, and that the government risks making the situation worse if it proceeds without engaging with community leadership.
Shortly thereafter, the Federal and Alberta governments reached a so-called “climate and energy agreement” that could see construction of an oil pipeline to the west coast begin as early as September 2027.
Potential consequences
The federal government, since the new administration took office over a year ago, has been laser-focused on growing the economy, strengthening internal and international trade, mobilizing private investment–domestic and foreign. It has done so in the face of a fractured world order and tensions within the country. Its energy policies prioritizing economic growth over protecting the environment according to polling, have gained widespread public support.
However, it must be emphasized, these actions—concentrating executive branch power, streamlining regulations, accelerating project approvals— could have dire consequences: risks of massive harm to the environment, to human health and safety. They may also result in catastrophic accidents.
I have documented the consequences of the Harper government which, bent on building an “energy superpower,” weakened or removed regulations in line with corporate interests and implemented fiscal austerity and privatization. These forces aligned on the night of July 6, 2013, with the oil train derailment and explosion which decimated the town of Lac-Mégantic, killing 47 people, leaving 27 children without their parents, leaving a community with a legacy of economic, health and environmental aftershocks.
Canadian citizens and policy makers should never forget what happened in Lac-Mégantic: why it happened, who was responsible, and what lessons should be learned? So often the lessons are forgotten.
Then it happens again.
