Special expropriation rules for VIA’s High Speed Rail project erode long-standing property protections, due process, warns the MEI
Montreal, November 24, 2025 – Special expropriation rules would allow Via Rail subsidiary to dispossess Canadians of their land without normal due process, warns the MEI.
“Ottawa has thrown out the normal safeguards that protect homeowners from abusive expropriation,” says Gabriel Giguère, senior policy analyst at the MEI. “Under this special system for VIA Rail, Canadians are no longer treated as sellers, but as people to be dispossessed.”
The High-Speed Rail Network Act, buried in the federal budget omnibus bill, grants sweeping new expropriation powers for the planned high-speed rail line between Toronto and Quebec City. The Act creates a new Crown corporation, VIA HFR, a subsidiary of VIA Rail, to oversee and carry out the project.
Major amendments to the Expropriation Act are being introduced in order to fast-track the project, notably by allowing VIA to override long-standing expropriation steps.
Expropriation—the taking of private property for public use—normally requires the government to first make a good faith purchase offer and attempt to negotiate. This protects landowners from unnecessary takings and ensures fair compensation.
The new law explicitly removes this requirement, eliminating the obligation to attempt to negotiate a common accord between the landowner and the government.
If VIA decides it needs a property for its project, it can get the Minister of Transport, Steven MacKinnon, to directly issue a notice of expropriation. It does not need to send an offer, negotiate, or demonstrate that a purchase attempt was made.
Other changes include eliminating the possibility of a public hearing. Under the previous law, once an objection was received, the Minister could call a public hearing in order to consult with the wider community about the impacts of the proposed expropriation. This form of consultation is entirely done away with.
The Crown corporation may now also issue a prohibition on work, freezing any land it may require for up to four years. In the interim, the landowner is legally barred from doing anything to their property except preventing deterioration.
A landowner’s recourse is narrow. They have 30 days to submit an objection upon receiving a notice of expropriation. Previously, the Minister had 120 days to respond. The government has now stretched that window to two years for properties targeted by Via Rail’s project.
“VIA will be able to take your land, freeze your property, and cancel your sale agreements, all without negotiation,” says Giguère. “This government seems to have forgotten the lessons learned from the expropriation of farmlands for the Mirabel airport project in the 1960s.”
Suspending key elements of the Expropriation Act to streamline disregards the rights of the expropriated.
The MEI analyst also expresses concerns for the livelihood of the many farmers who risk being affected by the process, as removing even a small share of their land can mean the difference between a profitable operation and a money-losing one.
“Steamrolling property owners is no way to treat Canadians, and trying to bury such an erosion of property rights in an omnibus bill only adds insult to injury,” says Giguère. “Unfortunately, the fact that Ottawa feels comfortable making such an exception once increases the likelihood that it will do so again.”
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The MEI is an independent public policy think tank with offices in Montreal, Ottawa, and Calgary. Through its publications, media appearances, and advisory services to policymakers, the MEI stimulates public policy debate and reforms based on sound economics and entrepreneurship.
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