Updated September 9, 2025 @ 2:29pm
Ontario Premier Doug Ford wants municipalities to get rid of automated speed cameras — or else he will.
The City of Toronto said Tuesday that several automated speed cameras were cut down in recent days, part of an ongoing trend that has seen 800 incidents of vandalism against the cameras reported to the city this year.
Ford called the cameras nothing more than a cash grab for the city and suggested there are better ways to deter speeding, particularly in school zones.
"If you want to slow down traffic at school, you put the big huge signs, big flashing lights, 'Crossing Area,'" he said after an unrelated speech Tuesday morning.
"People will slow down."
Toronto first asked for speed cameras back in 2016 and a year later, then-premier Kathleen Wynne made changes to the Highway Traffic Act to allow for automated speed camera use in school and community zones.
Toronto has had 75 automated speed cameras for years, and the city said in January it would be adding 75 more by the end of this year.
However, Ford indicated he has other plans.
"Hopefully the cities will get rid of them like Mayor (Steven) Del Duca did in Vaughan, or I'm going to help them get rid of them very shortly," he said.
NDP Leader Marit Stiles scoffed when she heard the premier's comments.
"What an idiotic thing to say," she said.
The cameras are about trying to ensure road safety, aside from the issue of municipal revenue generation, Stiles said.
"I think that if you're speeding, you should stop speeding, because kids are going to get killed and pedestrians get killed, and nobody, nobody wants to hurt anyone," she said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2025.
