Bill PR34 explained in plain English
The Roman Catholic Diocese of St. Catharines in Ontario Act, 2026
Ontario legislature bill summary, status, timeline, sponsor, votes, and official sources.
At a glance
Official Legislative Assembly of Ontario snapshot for 44th Parliament, 1st Session. Representative vote breakdowns appear when the Assembly publishes an Ayes and Nays page for the bill.
Our plain-language take, written for civic education.
Source: By PoliticalData.ca
The Roman Catholic Diocese of St. Catharines in Ontario Act, 2026, incorporates the Roman Catholic Bishop of St. Catharines as a corporation sole and transfers property to it.
Bill Pr34, The Roman Catholic Diocese of St. Catharines in Ontario Act, 2026, incorporates the Roman Catholic Bishop of St. Catharines as a corporation sole. It transfers ownership of certain real and personal property to this new corporation. The corporation is granted powers to acquire, hold, sell, lease, mortgage, and otherwise deal with land, as well as to borrow money and issue debt.
- Incorporates the current Roman Catholic Bishop of St. Catharines and his successors as a corporation sole under the name "The Roman Catholic Diocese of St. Catharines in Ontario".
- Transfers ownership of specified real and personal property, located within defined territorial boundaries, to the new corporation.
- Specifies that property transferred to the corporation remains subject to any applicable trusts.
- Grants the corporation powers to acquire, hold, sell, lease, mortgage, and otherwise deal with land.
- Grants the corporation powers to borrow money, issue bonds and debentures, and mortgage its property.
- Empowers the Bishop of St. Catharines to execute documents on behalf of the corporation.
- Outlines procedures for succession and for managing the corporation's affairs during vacancies or incapacities of the Bishop.
- The Roman Catholic Bishop of St. Catharines
- Successors to the Bishop of St. Catharines
- The Roman Catholic Episcopal Corporation for the Diocese of Toronto, in Canada
- The Roman Catholic Episcopal Corporation for the Diocese of Hamilton, in Ontario
- The Roman Catholic Episcopal Corporation for the Diocese of Kingston in Canada
- Individuals or entities who have entered into contracts or incurred liabilities with the previous diocesan corporations affecting the transferred property.
- The corporation has the right to register its title to any land transferred to it.
- Property vested in the corporation is subject to any applicable trusts.
- The corporation has the power to acquire, hold, sell, convey, lease, mortgage, or otherwise deal with lands.
- The corporation has the power to borrow money, issue debt, and mortgage its property.
- The Act comes into force on the day it receives Royal Assent, which was April 15, 2026.
- The specific boundaries of the "territorial boundaries" are defined by reference to how they existed on June 1, 2025, and their location on the day the Act came into force, which may require further clarification.
- While the Act empowers the corporation to deal with property, the extent of these powers is subject to any applicable trusts.
This Act establishes the Roman Catholic Diocese of St. Catharines in Ontario as a corporation sole.
The corporation is permitted to acquire and hold lands, notwithstanding any existing laws regarding mortmain (holding of land by corporations) or charitable uses.
Source: Section 5(1)
Generated using AI from official bill text. Not legal advice. It is written by PoliticalData.ca for civic education, automatically checked and spot-reviewed before publishing.
Official textProcess Snapshot
Vote Summary
This bill does not have a published recorded division in the current official sources, so representative-by-representative vote counts are not shown.
No published representative vote breakdown
The current official sources do not publish a recorded division breakdown for this bill, so there is no representative-by-representative table to show.
Official sources
Status, sponsor, votes, and timeline on this page are drawn from these official legislative sources and public records. Each summary above is attributed to its own source.
How this data is sourced