Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is ruling out the use of the military to deal with any of the ongoing protests at the border or in Ottawa, saying it is up to police to deal with them.
“We never want to deploy the army against Canadian citizens,” Mr. Trudeau told a Friday afternoon news conference on Parliament Hill as trucks were parked outside, blocking Wellington Street, not far from where he was speaking.
“Using military forces against civilian populations in Canada or any other democracy is something to avoid having to do at all costs. That’s why the solution right now is focused on police forces enforcing the law that exists, protecting public order in the way that they are trained to do, in a predictable, progressive approach that doesn’t skip any steps, that works to conclude this situation peacefully,” Mr. Trudeau said.
“We are a long way from ever having to call in the military, although, of course, we have to be ready for any eventuality, but it is not something we are seriously contemplating at this time.”
The Prime Minister noted that politicians do not direct police, but the RCMP is working with provincial and local forces to enforce the law. “Everything is on the table because this unlawful activity has to end – and it will end,” he said, adding he could not say much about how that would happen.
He said he hoped the protesters would choose to leave peacefully now that they had been heard.
He said he did not think the city of Ottawa had exhausted its tools and resources, noting the police force has been given resources from the Ontario Provincial Police and the RCMP.
Mr. Trudeau was speaking after talks Friday with U.S. President Joe Biden about protests affecting the flow of goods across the border and the shared challenges of dealing with them.
A statement released from the White House said the two leaders agreed that the actions of the individuals obstructing travel and commerce between the two countries are having significant impacts on people’s lives and livelihoods.
“The President expressed his concern that U.S. companies and workers are experiencing serious effects, including slowdowns in production, shortened work hours, and plant closures. The Prime Minister promised quick action in enforcing the law,” it said.
In Toronto, Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced earlier Friday that he was declaring a state of emergency in response to the ongoing blockades in Ottawa and Windsor, Ont.
Mr. Trudeau described the announcement as “responsible and necessary.”
Mr. Ford said he would use legal measures to enact orders making it “crystal clear” that it is illegal and punishable to block and impede the movement of goods, people and services along critical infrastructure.
The Premier said that includes protecting international border crossings, 400-series highways, airports, ports, bridges and railways.
Queen’s Park Reporter Jeff Gray reports here on Mr. Ford’s announcement.
This is the daily Politics Briefing newsletter, written by Ian Bailey. It is available exclusively to our digital subscribers. If you’re reading this on the web, subscribers can sign up for the Politics newsletter and more than 20 others on our newsletter signup page. Have any feedback? Let us know what you think.
TODAY’S HEADLINES
PROTESTS
BIDEN TEAM PUSHING FOR ACTION ON BORDER-CROSSING PROTESTS – The Biden administration is pressing Ottawa to intervene to end blockades at border crossings and is offering help from the Department of Homeland Security. Story here.
TORIES SHIFT PROTEST POLICY – In a reversal of their earlier support for the protesters, federal Conservatives called Thursday for trucker blockades to end, as a new border protest in Manitoba joined similar efforts in Alberta and Ontario. Story here.
DANIEL DALE ON FALSE CANADIAN PROTEST CLAIMS – CNN’s Daniel Dale looks at several false claims about the ongoing Canadian protests against vaccine mandates, COVID-19 restrictions and the federal government. Story here.
POILIEVRE PROUD OF TRUCKERS – Conservative leadership candidate Pierre Poilievre said he is “proud” of the truckers and stands with them. The Ottawa-area MP made the remarks in an interview recorded Thursday for next week’s episode of the Postmedia podcast Full Comment with Anthony Furey. Story here.
SECURITY RISK CLOSES N.S. LEGISLATURE – The Nova Scotia Legislature will be temporarily closed to visitors starting Friday because of a “security risk.” James Charlton, chief clerk of the Nova Scotia Assembly, wouldn’t provide details on the threats or the locations involved but said ongoing protests in Ottawa and at the Ambassador Bridge were “a factor.” Story here from CBC.
MEANWHILE
CHAREST PODERING LEADERSHIP RUN – Le Devoir is reporting that former Quebec premier Jean Charest is seriously considering running for the leadership of the federal Conservatives, with a decision likely in a week. Story here.
BORDER RULES TO CHANGE : DUCLOS – The federal government is reviewing its pandemic-related border restrictions, and Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos said it will announce changes next week. Story here.
MANITOBA ANNOUNCES EASING OF RESTRICTIONS – Premier Heather Stefanson says Manitoba is accelerating its plan to ease COVID-19 restrictions and expects to have all public-health orders lifted in the coming weeks. Story here.
THIS AND THAT
The projected order of business at the House of Commons for Feb.11 is here.
BERGEN NAMES NEW CHIEF OF STAFF – Interim Conservative Leader Candice Bergen has appointed William Stairs as her chief of staff. The previous chief of staff in the office of the leader of the Official Opposition was Tausha Michaud. Mr. Stairs was a communications director for former prime minister Stephen Harper, among other senior government roles that included chief of staff in the minister’s office at Treasury Board and the Justice Department. Since leaving politics, he has run his own communications consulting firm and taught strategic communications at Carleton University.
RAE ON PROTESTS – Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations is here speaking out on what he thinks is really going on with the protests.
KIND WEEK AHEAD – Next week is the third week of February, which means it’s Canada’s first National Kindness Week. It’s the result of an act brought forward by former senator Jim Munson as a private member’s bill in the Senate and sponsored in the House by Conservative MP Michael Barrett and Liberal MP Emmanuella Lambropoulos. All three will participate in a Tuesday news conference on the subject.
THE DECIBEL – Friday’s edition of The Globe and Mail podcast features Zexi Li, an Ottawa resident who was key to a civil suit that muted the honking of trucker convoy horns in the city’s downtown. Zexi shares what it’s been like living among the cacophony, how she slept and why she agreed to be the public face of the class-action suit. The Decibel is here.
PRIME MINISTER’S DAY
Private meetings. The Prime Minister received a COVID–19 briefing from Theresa Tam, the Chief Public Health Officer of Canada. He also participated in a meeting hosted by U.S. President Joe Biden to discuss Ukraine with the leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Poland, the United Kingdom, the European Union and NATO. A news conference was also scheduled.
LEADERS
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, with MP Niki Ashton, met with chiefs about internet connectivity over Indigenous lands.
No schedule released for other party leaders.
OPINION
Andrew Coyne (The Globe and Mail)on time being an ally and boredom a friend in ending the trucker protests: “Much as many may be desiring a quick end to the standoff, that option is not realistically open to us. The better course is what might for want of a better word be called containment, neither assaulting the encampment nor allowing it to spread, but slowly squeezing it: shrinking its footprint, restricting access in or out (a perimeter fence could be useful in this regard), controlling and curtailing its supply lines, increasing the legal and financial pressures on the participants (licences and insurance would both seem points of vulnerability) and depriving them, as much as possible, of the oxygen of publicity – smothering them, as it were, with inactivity. As time goes on, nothing happens, and the media gets bored, so will many of them. That will make it easier to separate the hard-core ideologues from the ones who are just along for the ride – not all at once, most likely, but by attrition, an arrest here, an injunction there.”
John Ibbitson (The Globe and Mail)on how Ontario Premier Doug Ford has astutely shifted blame to Ottawa in the runup to Ontario’s spring election: “Ontario is in turmoil from one end of the province to the other – from a blockade in Windsor to trucker protests in Ottawa. But those disturbances are unlikely to reshape the outcome of the June 2 provincial election. Progressive Conservative Premier Doug Ford appears to be pursuing the politically astute tactic of shifting responsibility to the federal government, while at the same time not alienating voters who may share the protesters’ opposition to pandemic restrictions. It could help him get re-elected.”
Adam Radwanski (The Globe and Mail)on high-profile Conservatives launching a bid to convince party leaders that climate policy matters: “Even as their party appears to be abandoning its short-lived support for carbon pricing, a small group of high-profile Conservatives is launching an effort to get their next leader to take climate policy seriously. Conservatives for Clean Growth, launched on Thursday morning, bills itself as an organization of long-term “activists, advisers and members” who believe “it’s critical for the Conservative Party of Canada to have a credible plan on the environment.”
Daniel Panneton (Contributed to The Globe and Mail)on how the trucker convoy shows how Canadians are being sucked into larger conspiratorial narratives: “Rising food costs and supply chain issues were among the legitimate issues highlighted during the protests, but panic-shopping in the early days of the pandemic demonstrated how the prospect of empty shelves can easily induce irrational behaviour. Already, right-wing extremist activity has surged and increasing numbers of Canadians are thinking conspiratorially. Trust in institutions is failing, and it’s vital that journalists and particularly lawmakers recognize how extremists can opportunistically redefine and hijack existing issues, and hold their peers accountable when they amplify or normalize accelerationist narratives. Failure to do so, or worse, attempting to harness and manipulate them for political gain, will only pull Canada deeper into our present quagmire.”
Hamish Telford (Contributed to The Globe and Mail) on how returning the BC Liberals to glory will be a very tall order for Kevin Falcon: “Under the successful leadership of both Mr. Campbell and Ms. Clark, the liberal and conservative factions in the party were held together by a relentless focus on economic issues, while social issues were generally held in abeyance. Even party stalwarts such as Rich Coleman and Mary Polak held their socially conservative views in check. However, in the past election, some social conservatives in the party were unwilling to suppress their convictions. One candidate suggested that free contraception was akin to eugenics, while another opposed rainbow crosswalks in her community. These candidates did the party irreparable harm in many urban ridings. It will be difficult for Mr. Falcon to put this genie back in the bottle, and even if he is successful it may not be enough.”
Mohammed Adam (The Ottawa Citizen)on how Ottawa is under siege because police inaction enabled it: “Yes, policing is hard even at the best of times, and harder still, when faced with protesters who have turned into occupiers. But let’s be clear about one thing: Ottawa is under siege because police inaction enabled it. Police are now having a hard time ending the demonstration because they let it fester in the first place. They have a lot of questions to answer, not only for how they handled this protest but, critically, going forward.”
Susan Prentice and Lisa Pasolli (Policy Options)on why there is no go reason for Ontario to delay signing a child-care agreement: “All Ontarians – not just parents of young children – should welcome Ottawa’s national child-care policy and urge the province to sign on. Ontario is the last holdout on the national initiative. While Premier Doug Ford dithers, a small minority is trying to weaken the pan-Canadian policy. They are trying to undermine the national approach, for reasons that include skepticism, financial self-interest and old-fashioned nostalgia for the 1950s family. While they may have the Ford government’s ear, they should not.”
Got a news tip that you’d like us to look into? E-mail us at tips@globeandmail.com. Need to share documents securely? Reach out via SecureDrop.
OTTAWA – The federal agency that investigates election infractions found insufficient evidence to support suggestions Beijing wielded undue influence against the Conservatives in the Vancouver area during the 2021 general election.
The Commissioner of Canada Elections’ recently completed review of the lingering issue was tabled Tuesday at a federal inquiry into foreign interference.
The review focused on the unsuccessful campaign of Conservative candidate Kenny Chiu in the riding of Steveston-Richmond East and the party’s larger efforts in the Vancouver area.
It says the evidence uncovered did not trigger the threshold to initiate a formal investigation under the Canada Elections Act.
Investigators therefore recommended that the review be concluded.
A summary of the review results was shared with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service and the RCMP. The review says both agencies indicated the election commissioner’s findings were consistent with their own understanding of the situation.
During the exercise, the commissioner’s investigators met with Chinese Canadian residents of Chiu’s riding and surrounding ones.
They were told of an extensive network of Chinese Canadian associations, businesses and media organizations that offers the diaspora a lifestyle that mirrors that of China in many ways.
“Further, this diaspora has continuing and extensive commercial, social and familial relations with China,” the review says.
Some interviewees reported that this “has created aspects of a parallel society involving many Chinese Canadians in the Lower Mainland area, which includes concerted support, direction and control by individuals from or involved with China’s Vancouver consulate and the United Front Work Department (UFWD) in China.”
Investigators were also made aware of members of three Chinese Canadian associations, as well as others, who were alleged to have used their positions to influence the choice of Chinese Canadian voters during the 2021 election in a direction favourable to the interests of Beijing, the review says.
These efforts were sparked by elements of the Conservative party’s election platform and by actions and statements by Chiu “that were leveraged to bolster claims that both the platform and Chiu were anti-China and were encouraging anti-Chinese discrimination and racism.”
These messages were amplified through repetition in social media, chat groups and posts, as well as in Chinese in online, print and radio media throughout the Vancouver area.
Upon examination, the messages “were found to not be in contravention” of the Canada Elections Act, says the review, citing the Supreme Court of Canada’s position that the concept of uninhibited speech permeates all truly democratic societies and institutions.
The review says the effectiveness of the anti-Conservative, anti-Chiu campaigns was enhanced by circumstances “unique to the Chinese diaspora and the assertive nature of Chinese government interests.”
It notes the election was prefaced by statements from China’s ambassador to Canada and the Vancouver consul general as well as articles published or broadcast in Beijing-controlled Chinese Canadian media entities.
“According to Chinese Canadian interview subjects, this invoked a widespread fear amongst electors, described as a fear of retributive measures from Chinese authorities should a (Conservative) government be elected.”
This included the possibility that Chinese authorities could interfere with travel to and from China, as well as measures being taken against family members or business interests in China, the review says.
“Several Chinese Canadian interview subjects were of the view that Chinese authorities could exercise such retributive measures, and that this fear was most acute with Chinese Canadian electors from mainland China. One said ‘everybody understands’ the need to only say nice things about China.”
However, no interview subject was willing to name electors who were directly affected by the anti-Tory campaign, nor community leaders who claimed to speak on a voter’s behalf.
Several weeks of public inquiry hearings will focus on the capacity of federal agencies to detect, deter and counter foreign meddling.
In other testimony Tuesday, Conservative MP Garnett Genuis told the inquiry that parliamentarians who were targeted by Chinese hackers could have taken immediate protective steps if they had been informed sooner.
It emerged earlier this year that in 2021 some MPs and senators faced cyberattacks from the hackers because of their involvement with the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, which pushes for accountability from Beijing.
In 2022, U.S. authorities apparently informed the Canadian government of the attacks, and it in turn advised parliamentary IT officials — but not individual MPs.
Genuis, a Canadian co-chair of the inter-parliamentary alliance, told the inquiry Tuesday that it remains mysterious to him why he wasn’t informed about the attacks sooner.
Liberal MP John McKay, also a Canadian co-chair of the alliance, said there should be a clear protocol for advising parliamentarians of cyberthreats.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17, 2024.
WINNIPEG – The federal New Democrats have kept a longtime stronghold in the Elmwood-Transcona riding in Winnipeg.
The NDP’s Leila Dance won a close battle over Conservative candidate Colin Reynolds, and says the community has spoken in favour of priorities such as health care and the cost of living.
Elmwood-Transcona has elected a New Democrat in every election except one since the riding was formed in 1988.
The seat became open after three-term member of Parliament Daniel Blaikie resigned in March to take a job with the Manitoba government.
A political analyst the NDP is likely relieved to have kept the seat in what has been one of their strongest urban areas.
Christopher Adams, an adjunct professor of political studies at the University of Manitoba, says NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh worked hard to keep the seat in a tight race.
“He made a number of visits to Winnipeg, so if they had lost this riding it would have been disastrous for the NDP,” Adams said.
The strong Conservative showing should put wind in that party’s sails, Adams added, as their percentage of the popular vote in Elmwood-Transcona jumped sharply from the 2021 election.
“Even though the Conservatives lost this (byelection), they should walk away from it feeling pretty good.”
Dance told reporters Monday night she wants to focus on issues such as the cost of living while working in Ottawa.
“We used to be able to buy a cart of groceries for a hundred dollars and now it’s two small bags. That is something that will affect everyone in this riding,” Dance said.
Liberal candidate Ian MacIntyre placed a distant third,
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024
OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau say the Liberals have “all sorts of reflections” to make after losing a second stronghold in a byelection in Montreal Monday night.
His comments come as the Liberal cabinet gathers for its first regularly scheduled meeting of the fall sitting of Parliament, which began Monday.
Trudeau’s Liberals were hopeful they could retain the Montreal riding of LaSalle—Émard—Verdun, but those hopes were dashed after the Bloc Québécois won it in an extremely tight three-way race with the NDP.
Louis-Philippe Sauvé, an administrator at the Institute for Research in Contemporary Economics, beat Liberal candidate Laura Palestini by less than 250 votes. The NDP finished about 600 votes back of the winner.
It is the second time in three months that Trudeau’s party lost a stronghold in a byelection. In June, the Conservatives defeated the Liberals narrowly in Toronto-St. Paul’s.
The Liberals won every seat in Toronto and almost every seat on the Island of Montreal in the last election, and losing a seat in both places has laid bare just how low the party has fallen in the polls.
“Obviously, it would have been nicer to be able to win and hold (the Montreal riding), but there’s more work to do and we’re going to stay focused on doing it,” Trudeau told reporters ahead of this morning’s cabinet meeting.
When asked what went wrong for his party, Trudeau responded “I think there’s all sorts of reflections to take on that.”
In French, he would not say if this result puts his leadership in question, instead saying his team has lots of work to do.
Bloc leader Yves-François Blanchet will hold a press conference this morning, but has already said the results are significant for his party.
“The victory is historic and all of Quebec will speak with a stronger voice in Ottawa,” Blanchet wrote on X, shortly after the winner was declared.
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and his party had hoped to ride to a win in Montreal on the popularity of their candidate, city councillor Craig Sauvé, and use it to further their goal of replacing the Liberals as the chief alternative to the Conservatives.
The NDP did hold on to a seat in Winnipeg in a tight race with the Conservatives, but the results in Elmwood-Transcona Monday were far tighter than in the last several elections. NDP candidate Leila Dance defeated Conservative Colin Reynolds by about 1,200 votes.
Singh called it a “big victory.”
“Our movement is growing — and we’re going to keep working for Canadians and building that movement to stop Conservative cuts before they start,” he said on social media.
“Big corporations have had their governments. It’s the people’s time.”
New Democrats recently pulled out of their political pact with the government in a bid to distance themselves from the Liberals, making the prospects of a snap election far more likely.
Trudeau attempted to calm his caucus at their fall retreat in Nanaimo, B.C, last week, and brought former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney on as an economic adviser in a bid to shore up some credibility with voters.
The latest byelection loss will put more pressure on him as leader, with many polls suggesting voter anger is more directed at Trudeau himself than at Liberal policies.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17, 2024.
