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“Taking into consideration the required investments for a prospective Ontario private legal retailer, we cannot in good conscience issue an unlimited number of licences,” said a joint statement from Finance Minister Vic Fedeli and Attorney General Caroline Mulroney.

When the Progressive Conservative government introduced legislation to create a regulatory regime for cannabis sales in August, it said it expected a flood of applications from those looking to run private stores. There could be as many as 1,000 retail pot shops in the province after cannabis was legalized, the Tories said at the time.

There were to be no caps on the number of stores when the retail model launched, but the government’s legislation allowed for flexibility when it came to the concentration of stores in individual markets.

On Thursday, the province blamed the federal government for the cannabis shortage, saying the Liberals must address the issue.

“We will continue to urge the federal government to take immediate action to ensure licensed producers ramp up production in order to meet the anticipated market demand for recreational cannabis,” the statement said.

The Progressive Conservative plan for pot was a stark change from the previous Ontario Liberal government’s rules.

The Liberals had planned to open 40 government-run retail cannabis shops by the summer of 2018, with the network of stores to expand to 150 by 2020.

The Tories changed the cannabis retail model because they said expanding the number of stores and moving to a private system would better address demand and curb black market sales.