No, it’s not Justin Trudeau’s fault that he used the emergency law to shut down the “freedom convoy.” But the entire political class, the police force, and society in general, emerge with a black eye from this dark episode in Canadian history.
Posted yesterday at 5:00am
A sad example of “the failure of federalism,” Judge Paul Rouleau wrote in his report presented on Friday. The image is not too strong.
Federalism must allow Canada to thrive by balancing preservation of national unity with respect for regional diversity. But for it to work, everyone has to do their bit. With the “Freedom Convoy” we had the opposite.
In his approximately 2,300-page report, exemplary work produced in record time, Judge Rouleau reveals the broken cogs of a mechanism in which, through lack of cooperation, everything has been steadily deteriorating.
From the start, the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) ignored information provided by the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) and the Parliamentary Protective Service, which warned of an ongoing occupation of the capital by hundreds of vehicles.
The Ottawa-Gatineau Hotel Association had also warned him that participants in the convoy wanted to reserve rooms for 30 to 90 days.
What did the police do? Rather than creating a contingency plan, the response manager said he was praying it would “get very cold” and that protesters would leave as soon as possible. In other words, “He hoped for the best without foreseeing the worst,” summarizes Judge Rouleau.
The worst has happened.
In the field, the SPO teams did not get along. For example, police officers conducted an operation that thwarted the agreement reached by the police liaison team to remove jerry cans, eroding trust in the demonstrators. Nobody seemed to understand the very useful role this team could play in defusing the situation. A lesson to remember.
The OPS, the Mayor of Ottawa and the Ottawa Police Services Board were also not on the same page. When the situation worsened, the Commission should have acted. It was his role. But she gave up on rebuffs from Police Chief Peter Sloly.
It’s a shame because the intervention to unlock the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor proved that when we join forces we can achieve quick results. In Quebec, the clear message from all politicians was also able to prevent truckers from becoming encrusted.
But in Ontario, Doug Ford’s government chose to escalate the situation. He was only too happy to drop the abomination on Justin Trudeau, who had limited powers to intervene even as protesters stood at the gates of Parliament.
The province had the power and the duty to act. But Doug Ford didn’t want to alienate his right-wing supporters on the eve of the election. His attitude was shameful. And cowardly for refusing to testify before the Rouleau Commission.
Justin Trudeau is not without blame, however. He, too, found something to his advantage as he saw the Conservatives split over the convoy, which also led to the ousting of leader Erin O’Toole.
The prime minister cheered on the protesters by describing them as a “small, marginal minority” who do not share “the views of Canadians,” for which he semi-apologized on Friday.
In reality, some truckers who had lost their livelihoods because of mandatory vaccinations at the border wanted to demonstrate against health regulations, which was legitimate. We must never forget that freedom of expression is one of our most precious values.
But it is true that other participants were not altar boys. They wanted to overthrow the government, spoke of a “Nuremberg 2.0 trial” and issued death threats. It is unfortunate that the new leader of the Conservative Party, Pierre Poilievre, supported the convoy despite the volatile and dangerous situation.
In the end, one thing is certain: if everyone had done their job properly, we would never have had to give the emergency law the hammer. It is clear that we need more unity among police forces in the future, as highlighted by several of the Rouleau report’s recommendations.
Collectively, we would also benefit from talking better to each other, rather than keeping our positions at loggerheads — fueled by misinformation from social and traditional media, the judge insists — which risk fueling more demonstrations in the future.
We are 39 million, we need to talk to each other.