Carney's Bill C-39 Strips Oversight From Pipelines and Nuclear Projects

A 250-page omnibus bill introduced on 21 September would exempt vast areas of Canada from environmental, Indigenous and labour protections — while Prime Minister Mark Carney enjoys global acclaim for his Davos speech on reconfiguring power in the shadow of Donald Trump.

The Building Canada Strong Act, Bill C-39, was tabled by Transport Minister and House Leader Steven MacKinnon. It expands the earlier fast-tracking designation for "projects of national interest" into "regions of national interest," a shift that could carve out sweeping zones from existing legal protections, according to Shiri Pasternak, an associate professor of criminology at Toronto Metropolitan University.

What does Bill C-39 actually change?

Federal ministers can now designate entire geographic regions as special economic zones. Pasternak argues this diminishes the sovereignty of parliament and bypasses local elected officials and affected citizens.

Arms-length environmental review boards are being eliminated. Decision-making for new pipelines, nuclear facilities, highways and other major infrastructure has shifted to the very bodies charged with promoting those sectors. The Canada Energy Regulator now directly assesses energy projects, and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission directly approves nuclear and uranium projects.

Cabinet approval is gone for most pipelines. Under the amended framework, it survives only for pipeline projects requiring more than 300km of new right of way. A significant pipeline that hews close to existing corridors is now exempt from federal cabinet oversight entirely.

The bill also explicitly adds the power to end a legal strike in the Canada Labour Code.

How does it hit Indigenous communities?

Indigenous peoples have fought for decades to constitutionally enshrine consultation rights on development affecting their lands. The new regime guarantees industry a one-year timeline for decisions. Communities must determine all cumulative impacts in the early stages of assessment — a demand Pasternak says "virtually wipes out" their opportunity to influence project direction, given how time-consuming and costly impact assessments are.

The legislative push comes just weeks after wildfire smoke decimated First Nations communities in northern Ontario, forcing mass evacuations.

Who lobbied for this?

As Narwhal magazine reported, the changes follow oil and gas industry lobbying that took the form of a literal wishlist of demands to speed up reviews for fossil fuel projects. Last March, the CEOs or executive chairs of 14 companies launched a public pressure campaign urging Carney to undo former prime minister Justin Trudeau's modest climate policies.

Pasternak calls Carney's approach a "carve-out" system of legal exceptionalism. "These aren't the sensational executive orders of Trump's bombastic political style, but more sophisticated and sly swipes at our existing framework of law," she writes.

What did the Investment Summit sell?

The bill landed after Carney's Canada Investment Summit in Toronto in September. It replaced Bill C-5 — which many feared was the worst rights rollback Canadians had ever seen — with something worse, in Pasternak's assessment.

The summit's leaked pitch book showed 167 projects offered to the highest bidder among 200+ private equity and sovereign wealth fund representatives. The projects include AI datacentres, publicly owned airports, defence manufacturing, and dozens of energy and mining ventures.

Carney claims the summit raised over $500bn in new foreign investment commitments. The Building Canada Strong Act delivers the regulatory concessions to make those projects viable — what Pasternak calls part of "a buffet of public wealth on the table."

What else is on that buffet?

One day after the summit, Carney introduced the Productivity Mega Deduction. It lets businesses immediately deduct the cost of a much broader range of assets, including pipelines, mining property, aircraft and bridges. The effective tax rate fell from 13% to 6.4% — the lowest of any major economy, including the US.

Carney has also promised C$280bn in federal subsidies to industry through tax write-offs and by shifting risk from capital to taxpayers via cheap credit and loans from the Canada Growth Fund, the Canada Infrastructure Bank and Export Development Canada.

Pasternak, a member of the Infrastructure Beyond Extractivism research team, argues the agenda reflects Carney's oft-repeated promise that Canada "has what the world wants." Canadians, she writes, are waking up to an elitist agenda that endangers the country rather than rescuing it — with Bill C-39 as its most crucial instrument.