UPDATE: ‘Freedom Convoy’ protests met threshold for invoking Emergencies Act: report
Posted Feb 17, 2023 06:00:00 PM.
The Public Order Emergency Commission says the Liberal government met the “very high threshold” for invoking the Emergencies Act amid the 'Freedom Convoy' protests last winter.
In a report released on Friday, Feb. 17 Justice Paul Rouleau concludes a series of policing failures and a “failure of federalism” led to a situation that spun out of control in downtown Ottawa.
He also says most of the emergency measures were appropriate.
Commissioner on the convoy protesters #cdnpoli @CityNewsTO pic.twitter.com/9LQTXc9opK
— Cormac Mac Sweeney (@cmaconthehill) February 17, 2023
Prime Minister Trudeau invoked the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14, 2022 for the first time since it replaced the War Measures Act in 1988, granting extraordinary powers to police and governments to limit the protesters’ right to assembly and freeze their bank accounts in the hopes of clearing the demonstrations and preventing protesters from returning.
Less than a week later, police from across the country launched a massive operation to dislodge the protest from the streets of Ottawa, ending in hundreds of arrests.
“I do not accept the organizers’ descriptions of the protests as lawful, calm, peaceful, or something resembling a celebration,” reads the report. “That may have been true in certain and in isolated areas.”
“The bigger picture reveals that the situation in Ottawa was unsafe and chaotic.”
What began as a protest over proposed vaccine mandates for cross-border truckers, quickly evolved to include not just growing discontent over other public-health restrictions, but also more radical figures who threatened violence, displayed symbols of hatred and aimed to overthrow the elected government.
The protesters occupied the downtown streets for three weeks, sparking copycat demonstrations at several border crossing in Ontario and Alberta.
The emergency commission heard from more than 75 witnesses, including Trudeau, the mayor of Ottawa, police chiefs and other law enforcement officials as well as citizens and convoy organizers, and introduced more than 7,000 documents into evidence over the course of six weeks last fall.
The report, prepared by Rouleau, comes just days ahead of Monday’s legal deadline for it to be tabled in Parliament.
The Commission was tasked with answering the three key questions: Why did the federal government declare the emergency? How did it use its powers? And were those actions appropriate?
