Lisa Thompson

Lisa Thompson has been a steady advocate for Ontario's agricultural sector — supply management in particular, which she's defended against both American pressure and domestic critics who argue the system inflates dairy and poultry prices for consumers. The supply management argument is more nuanced than either its defenders or critics usually present, and Thompson has engaged with it at a level of specificity that shows she understands the industry. The farmland protection side of the file is murkier. Ontario loses hundreds of acres of prime agricultural land to development every year, and the Ford government's approach to the Greenbelt — removing protected farmland from the buffer zone, then restoring it under political pressure — showed that development interests have real influence over land use decisions that should be made on agricultural and environmental grounds. Thompson has operated within those constraints without always pushing back on them.