Doug Ford informed Ontarians in a video call on Monday that he was moving through the streets of Toronto to help motorists caught in the snow, despite a recommendation from city police to stay away. House.
Nearly 60 centimeters of snow have fallen in southern Ontario since Sunday evening, forcing the closure of highways and schools. The situation was so serious in the morning that the Toronto police request to Torontonians not to drive unless the trip is “absolutely necessary”.
Premier Doug Ford, who lives in the Etobicoke district, west of the city center, however left his home to help motorists. The leader of the Progressive Conservative Party confirmed this himself on the CP24 network while he was driving, thus contravening, according to an expert, the rules concerning distracted driving. It is prohibited to “view a screen not related to driving, such as watching a video” while driving according to the Ontario government.
Maurice Masliah, consultant in road safety, specifies that under the Highway Code, the Prime Minister is not among the individuals exempted from the regulations on the use of screens while driving, such as the police or the fire services. “The Prime Minister seems to be contravening this article of the Highway Code, he assesses.
Offending drivers can be fined between $615 and $1,000 if caught in the act. Three demerit points are also added to the file. In the afternoon, however, a spokeswoman for the Toronto Police Service told the Duty that no complaint had been made to the police and that the service would not be investigating the case at this time.
Dangerous driving
Between 2015 and 2019, nearly one in five fatal collisions involved some form of driver distraction, according to an analysis by Transport Canada. 45 of the 305 deaths on Ontario roads in 2020 were attributable to distracted driving, according to data from the Ontario Provincial Police,
“Distracted driving is the leading cause of collisions, injuries, and deaths on our roads. Not drunk driving. Not speed,” insists the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police in a pamphlet published in 2019. According to Maurice Masliah, the risk of a collision while the Premier is looking at the camera during the interview is approximately 2, 5 times higher than normal.
In the PM’s car
The Prime Minister somehow came to the aid of Torontonians. A video published in the afternoon showed him, shovel in hand, in the street. Around 10 a.m., the premier even drove Etobicoke resident Eddy Kandic home after he had been stuck in his car for nearly two hours. “I see a blue van coming down the street and it was Doug Ford, I was in shock,” the young man told the Duty.
“He asked me if I was stuck, then he said ‘Get on board, I’ll drive you home'”, continues Eddy Kandic. The Torontonian finally immortalized the meeting in a video posted on the TikTok application. “I’m a taxi driver today,” says the Prime Minister at the wheel of his truck.
This story is supported by the Local Journalism Initiative, funded by the Government of Canada.