There has been much written on the Building Canada Act (“the Act”) since it was enacted in June 2025 as a part of Bill C-5, the One Canadian Economy Act.
Commentators are voluble that a regime that is designed to streamline regulatory approvals for designated projects of a “national interest”, reducing “red tape” and shortening federal review and approval timelines has emerged at a moment of acute economic nationalism within Canada: encouraging the country to build big in response to trade pressure from the United States.
However, comparatively little has been written about similar trends occurring (or not occurring) in various forms in Provinces and Territories across the country, the interrelationship between those developments and the federal efforts.
This first edition of the Canadian Bar Association NEERLS journal draws on member submissions spanning five provinces: Newfoundland and Labrador, Québec, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia, to assess how regulatory processes are (or are not) being streamlined for projects of national, or local, importance. Reflective of the sheer volume of changes across the country, while two articles cover developments in each of Alberta and Ontario – the content does not overlap and the pieces can be read as complimentary.
- In How Provinces Are Positioning for Projects of National Importance Under the Building Canada Act, Terri-Lee Oleniuk, Charles Kazaz et. al. representing the Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP offices in Calgary, Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto provide an comprehensive summary of recent developments in British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and Québec, including developments under BC’s existing cooperation agreement with the federal government as well as the Infrastructure Projects Act for “provincially significant projects”; a summary of hits and misses under the Canada-Alberta MOU; the “one project, one process, one decision” framework adopted in Ontario; and a sequence of targeted legislative reforms in Québec under Bills 5, 69 and 81 to enact a targeted project-specific approach to accelerated approvals.
- In Speed Without Structural Reform: Thoughts on Alberta’s Proposed 120-Day Project Approval Timeline, Conor Chell and Manpreet K Dhillon of KPMG LLP’s Vancouver and Calgary offices focuses on Alberta’s Expedited 12-Day Approvals Act under Bill 30, acknowledging the objectives of the legislation while raising notable concerns about the likely efficacy absent broader structural reforms including increased regulatory capacity and changes to the underlying major project approval regime.
- In Ontario’s Bill 5 and the Special Economic Zones Act, 2025: Legal Structure and Environmental Implications, Graham Reeder of Gowling WLG in Toronto explores developments under Ontario’s omnibus Special Economic Zones Act, 2025 (“SEZA”), which delegates broad cabinet authority to exempt designated projects from provincial statutes, regulations, and municipal bylaws, marking a material shift toward both executive-driven decision-making in Ontario.
- Finally, in Opportunities in Newfoundland and Labrador to streamline regulatory processes for National Interest Projects under the Building Canada Act, Morgan Chafe of McInnes Cooper, in St. John’s explains that although the province is home to several major projects including the Bay du Nord offshore oil project and the proposed development of new hydroelectric capacity at Gull Island, it does not currently have companion legislation to the Building Canada Act. As a consequence, several bottlenecks exist that create opportunity for better alignment between provincial and federal processes, better guidance for proponents assembling benefits plans, and better coordination with local government driven processes.
Read as a whole, the articles demonstrate that different provincial governments are actively experimenting with differing approaches to federal-provincial coordination and procedural consolidation based on discretionary designation mechanisms. Several provinces have released companion legislation to the Act, but not all. As our authors contributions highlight – many questions remain.
I would like to personally send a special thank you to the authors at Blakes, Gowlings, KPMG LLP, and McInnes Cooper for taking the time to contribute to this important effort. If you found this material informative, helpful or entertaining – please let me know: jvellone@blg.com.
John Vellone
PD Officer, NEERLS
Borden Ladner Gervais LLP