Today Ontario passed the Great Lakes Protection Act which will strengthen the province’s ability to keep the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River clean, as well as to protect and restore the waterways that flow into them.

Read Bill 66, Great Lakes Protection Act, 2015 here

Passing the Act enables the province to address significant environmental challenges to the Great Lakes, including climate change, harmful pollutants and algal blooms. The Act will also:

• Establish a Great Lakes Guardians’ Council to provide a collaborative forum for discussing and gaining input on issues and priorities relating to the Great Lakes.
• Allow the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change to set environmental targets and enable communities to address local problems.
• Require the establishment of monitoring programs on a number of water quality indices where needed, as well as regular public reporting.
• Require consideration of Traditional Ecological Knowledge in decisions made about the health of the Great Lakes if offered by First Nations or Métis communities.
• Enshrine Ontario’s Great Lakes Strategy, the province’s action plan on the Great Lakes, as a living document to be reviewed every six years and reported in the legislature every three years.

http://news.ontario.ca/m/34457

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Manning Environmental Law is a Canadian law firm based in Toronto, Ontario. Our practice is focussed on environmental law, energy law and aboriginal law. 

Paul Manning is a certified specialist in environmental law. He has been named as one of Canada’s leading Environmental Lawyers by Who’s Who Legal: Canada and ranked by Lexpert as one of Canada’s Leading Energy Lawyers.

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