Speed in government is a virtue—until it becomes a vice.
It has been disheartening to see Prime Minister Mark Carney and British Columbia Premier David Eby introduce expedient, excessive legislation under the guise of an emergency response to U.S. President Donald Trump’s ever-meandering tariff threats.
Their measures will concentrate authority, expand cabinet discretion, sidestep some existing mechanisms of oversight, restrict consultation and effectively exclude elected representatives and the public from the conversation about pivotal laws. All of it is cloaked by a get-‘er-done optimism, perhaps hubris, that Canada will somehow evolve into a G7 dynamo.
Carney and Eby employ similar arguments: that time cannot be frittered, that obstacles cannot be accommodated, that burdens cannot be imposed, and that their mandates are to build, baby, build. They assume the public accepts any shortcuts or consequences that might arise from their sudden swiftness. All these assumptions are at best questionable.
Bill C-5, , and Bill 15, when the Speaker broke a tied vote on it, arrive in the name of solving problems too long left to linger—housing supply, infrastructure deficits, climate adaptation, and comparably poor productivity. What’s not to like about that?
But good intentions do not absolve bad processes. And these bills threaten to erode something far more essential to public progress: our trust.
Bill C-5 gives the federal cabinet the power to expedite approvals and funds for initiatives that meet the government’s still-ambiguous priorities. Rather than subject projects to layered reviews from multiple departments, provinces and stakeholders, C-5 allows Ottawa to bypass much of that process at its discretion. But the law risks weakening federal-provincial and Indigenous-Crown land consultations, and it renders Parliament (including the government’s own caucus) as spectators of this centralized heft.
In 小蓝视频, Bill 15 arms the government with authority to override regulatory requirements and permitting processes to enable public and private projects it considers to be in the provincial interest. It reshapes how decisions are made for Crown land—thus, for Indigenous consultation—and provincially reviewed projects. Again, the role of the legislature as a guardrail is pretty much MIA.
Industry groups, far from universally supporting these efforts, have voiced concerns about unpredictability. They, like most of us, would like faster approvals—but not at the expense of transparency and legal certainty. A permitting system based on shifting political priorities is no more stable than a glacial one.
More stark is the impact on Indigenous consultation. Both bills present risks of non-compliance with the Crown’s duty to consult and accommodate First Nations. Fast-tracking infrastructure across territories without adequate consultation is not only bad policy—it is likely unconstitutional and contradicts both governments’ support of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. It may spur an Idle No More 2.0.
Concerns apply, too, for municipal governance. Cities and towns are not merely administrative units of the province. They are the governments closest to people’s lives. When local planning authority is stripped away in favour of provincial fiat, it alienates the very communities we’re trying to build.
It is possible to honour the need for speed without driving recklessly. That would mean building new frameworks for consultation that are faster lanes, but not drive-bys. It would mean ensuring that industry, politicians, local governments and Indigenous nations have real seats at the table—not simply post-hoc updates on what’s already been decided. It would also mean re-empowering legislative committees and non-partisan review bodies, not forgoing them.
Most worrisome is that both Bill C-5 and Bill 15 (and some municipal moves we are seeing lately) suggest a growing temptation among governments: to see the tools of democracy not as enablers, but as hindrances. Those impulses may yield short-term results. But they come with long-term consequences—among them, reduced public buy-in, legal pushback, and increasing cynicism about whether anyone is truly listening.
When processes are shortened, often what is cut is not delay for delay’s sake—it is consultation, deliberation and accountability. Obviously, there can be bureaucratic burdens, but these are often mistaken for the pillars of democratic decision-making.
In trying to be agile, governments have to respect how trust is fragile. We should not confuse the results of speed with legitimacy, nor conflate asserted authority with public consensus.
Sure, let’s instill more momentum for projects, infrastructure and housing, but not without the durable foundations that only consultation, compromise and co-operation can provide.
Governments are elected to protect us, not to be protected from. In their haste and impatience, Carney and Eby have misread their mandates and gone rogue. They would be well to remember that the approach to tame Trump is called Team Canada for a reason.
Kirk LaPointe is a Lodestar Media columnist with an extensive background in journalism. He is vice-president in the office of the chairman at Fulmer & Co.
