Ontario's Premier Accountability Dashboard · Queen's Park Watch
Bonnie Lysyk
Office of the Auditor General of Ontario
Former Ontario Auditor General (2013–2023). In November 2021, Lysyk released a landmark value-for-money audit on species at risk protection finding: permits to harm endangered species had increased 6,262% since 2009 (from 13 to over 800 annually); the Ministry of Environment had never denied a single permit application to harm at-risk species; ministry staff had "no direction on when to reject permit applications that would do harm, and consequently, they are always approved"; 10 of 15 members on the species advisory committee worked for industry, half as registered lobbyists; and no inspections were conducted to ensure permit conditions were followed. The Ford government's response was Bill 5, which made the audit's findings permanent by repealing the Endangered Species Act entirely.
Connected Scandals
The Ford government promised a comprehensive environmental assessment for a proposed landfill directly upstream from Canada's only population of the salamander mussel — then buried the reversal inside omnibus Bill 5 after winning a byelection on the promise, exempting a company whose owners donated $200,000 to the PCs from all provincial environmental review, leaving 33 species at risk in one of Canada's most biodiverse rivers with no provincial protection.
Her 2021 Auditor General report documented that permits to harm endangered species had increased 6,262% under Ford and the province had never denied a single application — findings that the Ford government's Bill 5 then made permanent by repealing the Endangered Species Act.