Integrity commissioner bans ‘Mr. X’ from lobbying for 2 years over Greenbelt scandal

A sign marks an entry point into the Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve, part of Ontario's Greenbelt , on Monday, May 15, 2023, THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young

TORONTO — Ontario’s integrity commissioner has banned a former mayor wrapped up in the Greenbelt land-swap probe from lobbying for two years.

The Office of the Integrity Commissioner of Ontario wrote Thursday that John Mutton, the former mayor of Clarington, failed to comply with the Lobbyists Registration Act on numerous occasions.

Mutton’s actions “undermine the Act’s purpose of transparency and public confidence in the independence of public sector decision making,” reads a published notice on the integrity commissioner’s website.

Mutton did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

When asked Thursday morning about the findings, Premier Doug Ford said he hadn’t seen them yet but added he has a clear message for anyone lobbying the government.

“Follow the rules,” he said. “If you don’t follow the rules, you deserve a punishment. Simple as that.”

Former integrity commissioner J. David Wake called Mutton “Mr. X” in his probe of the Greenbelt land swap, in which he found the province favoured certain developers over others.

Wake said in 2023 that Mr. X didn’t register to lobby the government on the Greenbelt, yet was pushing former housing minister Steve Clark’s office to remove a client’s land from the protected area so it could be developed.

His identity was revealed in media reports after the publication of Wake’s report.

Mutton’s violations of the lobbyist law, as detailed by the integrity commissioner, date back to 2016, when Mutton failed to register after lobbying three different public office holders.

NDP Leader Marit Stiles called on the integrity commissioner to reveal the names of those public officer holders and criticized Mutton’s actions, as set out in the report.

“These are the kind of people that this government is in business with – a lobbyist who has broken the law not once, not twice, but repeatedly for almost a decade," she wrote in a statement. “This is ridiculous, and we know that it is far from over.”

The legislative assembly just appointed a new integrity commissioner, Cathryn Motherwell, on Wednesday.

On several occasions between 2021 and 2023, Mutton failed to register after lobbying to get clients’ lands either removed from the Greenbelt or subject to a Minister’s Zoning Order, which overrides municipal decisions and speeds up development, the commissioner wrote.

Mutton also at several points put those office holders in a real or potential conflict of interest, including offering Toronto Raptors tickets and a round at a private golf course.

As well, he violated the act by lobbying when payment was contingent on success, the commissioner wrote, listing several instances of contingency fees totalling $875,000.

A second report on Greenbelt-related lobbying was also published Thursday by the integrity commissioner. It said planner Matthew Johnston failed to register after seeking to have a client’s properties removed from the Greenbelt.

The commissioner’s 2023 report said Johnston was working with developer Sergio Manchia, and that Manchia had given him a ticket to the stag and doe party for one of the premier’s daughters.

The findings follow another set of violations recently set out by the integrity commissioner.

Nico Fidani-Diker, a lobbyist who used to work for Premier Doug Ford, failed to comply with some rules while asking for clients’ land to be removed from the Greenbelt, the then-commissioner concluded.

Fidani-Diker failed to register after lobbying to try to get land removed from the Greenbelt and knowingly placed two public office holders in a real or potential conflict of interest by offering them tickets to a Toronto Maple Leafs game, Wake wrote.

A 2023 integrity commissioner report into the now-reversed Greenbelt land removals found that the government’s process favoured certain developers, and the RCMP is also conducting an investigation into the Greenbelt decisions.

The RCMP’s “sensitive and internal investigations” unit began a Greenbelt probe in October, but beyond the premier’s office confirming last summer that interviews were underway, there has been little indication of how close the Mounties may be to concluding their investigation.

Ford has previously said he is confident nothing criminal took place, but following a significant public outcry the premier reversed course and returned all parcels of land in question to the Greenbelt and promised not to touch it again.

The integrity commissioner’s 2023 report found that then-housing minister Steve Clark violated ethics rules, but said that he had no evidence of developers being specifically tipped off that the government was considering Greenbelt removals.

However, Wake said “it is more likely than not” that someone gave one developer a heads-up.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published April 17, 2025.