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The Ontario Court of Appeal has upheld a lower court's decision to reject a developer's constitutional challenge against a 2023 law that returned 15 parcels of land to the Greenbelt. The provincial legislation overturned Premier Doug Ford's initial plan to include protected land in development, but developer Minotar Holdings Inc. argued the law infringed upon the authority of superior courts and violated "unwritten constitutional principles."

In a 2-1 decision, the Appeal Court ruled that the developer's argument would "do real harm to the balance of the Constitution and must be rejected." Minotar Holdings had sued the province since 2017, claiming their 210-acre land was mistakenly included in the Greenbelt. In 2022, the developer and the province settled the lawsuit by excluding 37 acres from the protected land reserve, but the settlement was revoked a year later amid scandal involving Ford's decision to open up some Greenbelt land for development.

The law reintroduced the 15 parcels, including the 37-acre Minotar tract, and mandated that future Greenbelt boundary changes must be done through legislation rather than regulation, shielding the government from judicial oversight. The Appeal Court affirmed that the legislative changes altered legal rights through substantive law, which falls within well-established modes of regulation and does not violate the jurisdiction of superior courts.