What a strange judgment that was rendered by Judge Richard Mosley of the Federal Court. According to him, Justin Trudeau did not have “reasonable grounds” in 2022 to invoke the Emergency Measures Act (EMA) in order to expel the so-called freedom convoy from Ottawa.
• Read also: “Freedom convoy”: the Emergency Measures Act was “illegal”, rules the Federal Court
Really? His memory of the real context of the events at the very time they took place seems to have faltered. So let’s remember the facts. When the Trudeau government invoked the LMU, this illegal occupation of the National Capital had already been going on for weeks.
There was no hope of the convoy leaving the scene voluntarily. Even the towing companies refused to move the trucks. The damage caused to residents and businesses was also major.
Huge trucks honked their horns 24/7. The decibel level was such that citizens could no longer sleep. Many were verbally and physically harassed by occupants.
Journalists were threatened and pushed around on air. Occupants used their own children to place them between them and the police.
The contagion effect was felt elsewhere in Canada, the United States and Europe. The occupation of the Ambassador Bridge deprived the Canadian economy of billions of dollars.
Demanding the dismissal of Justin Trudeau and the lifting of health measures, the occupiers, made up largely of conspiracy theorists, also displayed neo-Nazi flags, American white supremacist symbols and a horde of “Fuck Trudeau” and “Fuck Legault” banners.
No other choice
The organization of the convoy was also partly financed by the American extreme right. Faced with such a never-ending mess, Justin Trudeau simply had no choice. He had to invoke the LMU. For what?
Because even before the arrival of the convoy, although widely announced on social media by organizers swearing that the convoy would stay in Ottawa as long as their “requests” were not granted, the responsible authorities had done nothing in prevention mode .
We are talking here about the crass inaction of the Ottawa police chief, the mayor of Ottawa and Prime Minister Doug Ford. The illegal occupation that followed was a direct result of this.
I wrote it then and I will say it again. Before the arrival of the convoy, competent police authorities reportedly set up a security perimeter around Parliament.
This would have blocked entry to trucks while respecting people’s right to peacefully demonstrate on foot. However, that is not what happened.
At the end of his resources, the Prime Minister of Canada had to intervene. The illegal occupation was taking place in the heart of the nation’s capital.
Faced with the astonishing inability of the Ottawa police to do their job, not to mention the deafening silence of Doug Ford, they had to put an end to it. Especially since the occupation was degenerating from week to week.
In extremis
In extremis, the only concrete tool available to Justin Trudeau at the time was the Emergency Measures Act. Which – and this is not a detail – is clearly more respectful of fundamental freedoms than its ancestor, the defunct and very authoritarian War Measures Act.
Strictly speaking, this is what the president of the Commission on the state of emergency, Judge Paul Rouleau, concluded last year.
His conclusion was that the invocation of the Emergency Measures Act was justified by a situation “getting out of control”. A euphemism considering the astounding rot of events.
That a year later, a Federal Court judge did not understand this is puzzling. Hence the importance of appealing this judgment.