After ‘lost opportunity’ First Nations meeting, Ford says he wants to collaborate

Posted: July 24, 2025

(July 23, 2025) By: Jack Hauen, The Trillium

Premier weighs in on future of EVs as ‘shadow summit’ pushes against ‘two-tiered’ health care

Economic issues took centre stage on Tuesday as Canada’s political leaders gathered in Huntsville to present a united front against American tariffs and figure out how to get major projects moving quicker.

But between meetings with Prime Minister Mark Carney and memorandum-signing photo ops, Premier Doug Ford found time to weigh in on his relationship with Indigenous leaders and the electric vehicle industry — while protesters next door called on premiers to do more to ensure the future of public health care.

‘I just want to work in collaboration’: Ford on First Nations

Ford softened comments he made on Monday suggesting he wouldn’t move forward with resource projects without First Nations’ say-so.

“Well, you can’t move forward without their collaboration and their buy-in,” Ford said after Monday’s meeting between First Nations leaders and Canada’s premiers, which one grand chief called a “lost opportunity.”

Ford added, “I can’t do something if they don’t want to do it.”

Asked on Tuesday if these comments amounted to granting First Nations veto power over major projects, the premier demurred.

“I just want to work in collaboration,” he said. “What we’re trying to do, and they know this, we’re trying to make their lives better. We’re trying to make their kids’ and their grandchildren’s lives better. No one is treating them better.”

Nishnawbe Aski Nation Grand Chief Alvin Fiddler said he hoped journalists recorded Ford’s earlier comments.

“Because, you know, there’s a court case happening right now. That will probably be used in (the case),” he said on Monday.

Ford said on Tuesday that he and Fiddler go way back, but suggested the grand chief is in the minority when it comes to relations with the province.

“I’ve known Alvin from Day 1. He’s a good person. But I can assure you, I’m getting endless calls from chiefs from around the province saying, ‘I want to be part of this. I want to be part of the economic zones.’ And those who want it, we’re going to work with them. Those who don’t, they’re going to lose out. Simple as that,” he said.

Fiddler said he didn’t think Ford was telling the truth about those calls.

“To be blunt, I don’t believe that,” he said on Monday.

‘The market will decide’ on EVs

Ford said he is prepared to continue government spending on electric vehicles, but that it’ll be the invisible hand that decides the outcome — not his.

At a press conference with Ford and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe on Tuesday, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith noted nine “bad laws” she hoped the prime minister would repeal or rewrite, an ask co-signed by Ford. Among those laws is the commitment to get to 100 per cent zero-emission new light-duty vehicle sales by 2035.

Ford was asked how the request to axe that commitment jives with his past enthusiasm for EVs — an industry into which he has poured billions in subsidies in an effort to make Ontario “the number one manufacturer of electric battery-operated cars in North America.”

“I always believe, I’m a big proponent of, the market dictates. The market will dictate, not governments will dictate,” he said.

Canada, Ontario and Quebec have spent a combined $52.5 billion on EV subsidies since 2020, a report from the parliamentary budget officer found last year.

“Let’s continue investing. I’m confident that eventually the EV sector, per se, will continue growing. But right now, the people are going to decide. But let’s not slow down on building the battery plants and any other EV plants,” Ford said.

Several automakers have scaled back EV investments as demand has slowed.

‘Shadow summit’ warns of ‘two-tiered’ health care

While Canada’s political leaders worked to present a united front on trade and deregulation, a gathering next door called for a bigger focus on health care.

“All of us want our country to do well,” Ontario Health Coalition executive director Natalie Mehra said in an opening address to guests at the “shadow summit,” hosted by her organization, the Canadian Health Coalition and the Ontario Federation of Labour.

“But if the only pressure on (Canada’s political leaders) comes from the Trump side and corporations who are taking this opportunity … to cash in, then we’ll lose the things that matter most to us — the values of equity and compassion that underlie public health care for all,” as well as other social programs, she said.

Ontario is already seeing “open, two-tiered Medicare,” Mehra said, pointing to patients who say they were upsold or duped into paying more at private clinics.

“We have thousands of patients who are being charged for all kinds of things when they go in for cataract surgeries,” she said. “Very commonly now they’re paying $7,000, $8,000, sometimes even $11,000 for the cataract surgery — a surgery that’s $500 under OHIP.”

“There’s no question that these private clinics are a fatal threat to single-tier public Medicare, to the principle that you get health care based on your medical need and not your ability to pay,” she said.

The Ontario Health Coalition has called on the federal government to take “all possible actions to bring Ontario into compliance so that patients are protected.”

Ontario recently expanded the types of procedures private health clinics can deliver.

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