The Ontario government is finally replacing the “G20 secret law” — more than four years after police heavy-handedness at the summit of world leaders in Toronto.

On Thursday, Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Liberals, backed by the Progressive Conservatives, passed Bill 35, the Security for Courts, Electricity-Generating Facilities and Nuclear Facilities Act by a vote of 73-15.

That’s the legislation replacing the Second World War-era Public Works Protection Act that gained infamy during the G20 when then premier Dalton McGuinty’s Liberals used it to pass a regulation giving police broad powers of arrest.

It was enacted to guard hydroelectric facilities against Nazi saboteurs, but Queen’s Park realized it was badly outdated after the G20.

The regulation passed by McGuinty’s cabinet was supposed to only clarify police powers within the secure summit site at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

But people were misled into believing it applied to a zone of five metres outside that cordoned-off area.

Even though only two of the 1,105 arrests made during the summit protests were linked to the 1939 legislation, there was a massive public outcry over what became known as the “G20 secret law.”

Both the Conservatives and the New Democrats repeatedly urged the Liberals to replace it.

Tory interim Leader Jim Wilson said his party was “outraged” that Ontarians’ civil liberties were trampled upon.

“Any reasonable person would say the right thing to do would be to side with the government and change (the) law,” said Wilson.

“It’s a question of justice.”

But NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said her party dissented Thursday because the new law has “very, very serious flaws” and does not go far enough to protect people’s rights.

Horwath noted anyone going to a courthouse will now have to produce identification before gaining entry and could have their vehicle searched.

“That is . . . an encroachment of current civil liberties,” she said.

Community Safety Minister Yasir Naqvi pointed out the new law is based on recommendations from a 54-page government-commissioned report by former chief justice Roy McMurtry.

“It really strikes the balance between civil liberties and personal safety and security,” said Naqvi, noting, in 2011, McMurtry urged that any new legislation focus on security at courthouses, nuclear facilities and other large electricity-generating stations.

Anyone hoping to enter such premises would be required to identify themselves and be subject to searches “where reasonable.”

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Under the new measure, scofflaws will face fines of up to $2,000 and jail sentences of up to 60 days.

The government believes the law closes the loopholes that Toronto police exploited — or misinterpreted — during the G20.

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