TORONTO — Premier Doug Ford is selling Ontario as “one of the most investable places anywhere in the world” at Prime Minister Mark Carney’s first Canada Investment Summit, and he has not told taxpayers which 15 projects are in the shop window.The two-day gathering opened Monday at the Four Seasons in Yorkville, with a gala Monday night and working sessions Tuesday. Carney wants $1 trillion in public, private and institutional capital over five years and told guests that funds managing more than $120 trillion had come to “peer into our shop window.” Washington’s next 50% duties on selected steel and aluminum products, dairy, furniture and paper take effect Tuesday.Ford issued his own pitch Sunday. “Ontario’s Deal Book includes 15 major projects worth tens of billions of dollars,” he said, listing guests from Kuwait, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Singapore, Qatar, Norway, Japan and Australia. He did not name the 15 projects or say how much Queen’s Park would spend to land them..A 66-page prospectus lists 167 projects nationwide, more than half of which are energy and mining. Conventional oil and gas sit at the front of the book, ahead of “clean energy,” ports, power, digital technology, advanced manufacturing and transportation. The deck includes a proposed $35-billion pipeline from Alberta to the BC coast, the Ksi Lisims LNG terminal and a Port of Churchill expansion. A disclaimer says listing a project is not an endorsement.Confirmed guests include BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, Blackstone President Jon Gray, Temasek’s Dilhan Pillay and APG’s Annette Mosman. The Globe and Mail has also reported invitations to state-linked houses in Abu Dhabi, Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong and China. Former prime minister Stephen Harper is scheduled to close the summit Tuesday. Carney teased Sunday that some economic activity was already moving. .A “Many vs. The Money” coalition of unions, First Nations and indigenous organizers, and housing and climate groups planned to gather at Nathan Phillips Square at 6 p.m. and march to the Art Gallery of Ontario dinner. Organizer Bianca Mugyenyi said the country’s future should not be “decided behind closed doors by billionaires, by bankers, by global investment firms.” Federal NDP Leader Avi Lewis has called the summit a plan to “save this country by selling it off.”Ford says Ontario has what the world needs. At the time of this publication, he has not named the 15 projects, and the new US tariffs take effect Tuesday.
