Hon. Victor Oh: Honourable senators, I rise today to oppose the recent use of the Emergencies Act. I believe that this act is a clear case of the government’s overreach, serving only to divide Canadians at a time when unity is what we need most.

The question I have for you today is: What kind of country are we becoming when we allow draconian measures, like this one, to deal with lawful protests by frustrated Canadians?

This is a difficult question. It forces us to reflect about who we are as a nation, what we can expect from our elected officials and how we protect Canadians’ values.

When I chose to immigrate here, Canada’s respect for democracy, human rights and the rule of law were what drew me in. These are some of the most important values, but at this moment, I believe our country is crossing a dangerous line in history. For the first time, the Emergencies Act is being used not to confront a terrorist attack on Canada but instead to address a peaceful protest, a protest made up of Canadians who are exhausted and angry at being told what to put into their bodies.

Colleagues, we may disagree with this protest. Most of us will disagree with the illegal action used to communicate their message. But we must ask ourselves, is the Emergencies Act a justifiable response to what are essentially peaceful, non-violent protests?

Since the Emergencies Act was first passed over 34 years ago, there have been many blockades in Canada. Yet we have never used the Emergencies Act. I ask you, senators, why is the Emergencies Act all of a sudden required when past policing powers seemed sufficient for blockades?

It should be noted that the blockades of the Ambassador Bridge in Ontario and at the Coutts border crossing in Alberta were resolved by police. Yet the Emergencies Act was still invoked.

So I ask what is different about the protests here in Ottawa. It seems that this action is difficult to justify elsewhere in Canada, but in Ottawa, when politicians are directly affected, they are quick to use the Emergencies Act. This makes the government look self-interested and authoritarian.

We must be under no illusion that this action will weaken Canada’s credibility to advocate for human rights around the world. How can our statements not be seen as hypocritical when we refuse to protect the rights of our citizens? It is no surprise that other countries have fixated on our recent actions, which clearly contradict the image of the rights and law that Canada has so carefully cultivated.

The truth being broadcast is that of a government that has given its security services extraordinary powers to freeze bank accounts without a warrant, the power to cancel an insurance policy without a warrant and the power to ban peaceful assembly anywhere. We must ask ourselves this: Do these actions reflect our Canadian values? We must also ask this: What is the justification for continuing the Emergencies Act now that the blockades have been lifted?

The government argues that the act is now needed to prevent future blockades and to prevent future funding for protests that are now prohibited. Senators, what we have now is a pre-emptive law in force. I feel that the current government has set a terrible precedent. There is a real risk that Canadians may lose trust in their government when it is clearly willing to extend its power over those who disagree with their policies.

When I came to Canada, I came to a united country. I’m sad to see today how much has changed. I believe this is the most divisive government that we have had.

Colleagues, there is clearly no emergency today and there is absolutely no justification in continuing with these measures. We should repeal them so we can begin to rebuild our unity.

We need a Prime Minister who is willing to talk to all Canadians. We deserve a Prime Minister who is willing to listen. He should not kneel with those he favours and scoff at those he deems unworthy. Imagine if the Prime Minister had responded this way to Black Lives Matter or Indigenous protesters; imagine how divided and violent our country would be today.

In this chamber, we should not be voting for motions that will compound divisions. I feel that is what we’ll be doing by supporting this motion. I hope all senators will join me in voting against this motion.

Thank you.

Hon. Patricia Bovey: Honourable senators, as I have said, while more certainly needs to be done on issues arising out of earlier protests, action is being taken by governments and society as a whole.

This past month in Ottawa, however, has been something different, as have been the protests in Manitoba, Alberta and British Columbia, which have come with a wide range of demands, even to taking over the government. To my mind, it was not a peaceful tone and, as we know, in Coutts firearms were found.

While crowds have been dispersed from Parliament Hill and downtown Ottawa, they do continue elsewhere and we have all heard of the potential of their popping up in different locations. Indeed, at noon today we received a situation advisory about what was going on at Rideau Centre. One of our members was locked into a building in which he was visiting. An hour later, a hold-and-secure advisory was announced at 1 Wellington Street and the Senate of Canada Building.

The protests at the Manitoba Legislative Building in Memorial Park in downtown Winnipeg have drawn the concern of many, including our mayor. Likewise, it too is compromising the lives of those who live in that part of Winnipeg. If it was summer, with my windows open, I too would have heard the noise and the trucks.

In downtown Winnipeg, they are also unable to sleep. They have a fear of going out and have seen their neighbourhood filled with trucks. I have had many calls from my neighbours about the anxiety even their pets have. So the concerns do continue.

What we have seen transpire in Ottawa since January 28 has morphed into what I see as a very misguided use of legal right to assembly and, indeed, it has become a lawless occupation which rendered the many Ottawa citizens who live downtown and in the ByWard Market virtual prisoners in their homes. They faced incessant noise, threats, the pervading smell of diesel and a fear of going out, especially when wearing their masks.

I have heard of parents in different parts of Ottawa being in parks with their children and being harassed for wearing masks. Citizens of Ottawa missed work. Businesses were shut. Millions of dollars were lost. I could go on. We could talk about the other sites as well.

I’m sure we are all aware of the harassment of our staff, especially those of visual diversities and — as was so aptly noted by Senator Moodie — I would like to say a thank you and express a concern for those who work with us.

I have heard my colleagues’ opinions on the enactment of the Emergencies Act. While I appreciate the concerns of my colleagues, I have concluded that, given this unique situation, the act is necessary at this time.

We have all heard the arguments regarding whether the threshold for implementing the act has been met. I believe that threshold has been met. Those arguments will be ongoing for a very long time after this situation has passed and, indeed, we all know there are many such legal arguments playing out as we speak.

My reasons for supporting the use of this instrument are not complicated. We need to uphold civic responsibilities and real freedoms fought for and died for by our parents and grandparents in the past and by our military members today. Those freedoms come with responsibilities, as Senator Cordy said earlier.

[Translation]

I think that the objectives of the Emergencies Act have been adapted to address the issues we are facing. I also believe the measures are justified, since they specifically target the people who were occupying our capital city and who were a threat to our international trade and our economy. I am referring to the truckers, the vast majority of whom opposed what happened.

[English]

I also do not believe we should be subject to foreign donors funding civil unrest in Canada. I, quite frankly, am upset by the number of people who were part of this occupation who have come from beyond our borders. I am very aware of the many American licence plates that were here in Ottawa and are currently in Winnipeg.

We are a sovereign nation and we should expect our government to defend that sovereignty. This, for me, is a basic concept.

The measures expire in 30 days. The act is subject to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Parliament will have the ultimate say in approving the implementation and repeal of the act while monitoring its use. These measures seem a reasonable response to what has become an unreasonable situation for many Canadians.

Honourable senators, the spread of disinformation amongst our population regarding public health measures during a pandemic which has taken the lives of so many is very concerning. We have all been touched by those who have died or been terribly ill with this virus, and we can’t count the number of families who have had their lives changed irrevocably.

Not to be vaccinated at this point, despite the scientifically proven effectiveness of vaccines, is extremely disappointing. The anti-vaccine rhetoric, which has been shared online for any variety of unscientific reasons, has become tremendously concerning. There is no easy solution to this and it will remain an obstacle to our recovery. That is unfortunate.

This country is very close to reaching the finishing line regarding the virus. We have come to this point through following public health guidelines, getting vaccinated, staying home when requested to, missing family time, foregoing travel and sacrificing out of respect for one another’s health and well-being. We have come too far to make these sacrifices not pay off for more normal times which we all want and need.

This is not the time to shut down trade, as the convoy forced. This is not the time to occupy the nation’s capital, as it has. This is not the time to make life worse for everyone here, as was done, especially when we were all so close to the end game.

These actions are not helpful. They are preoccupying us all when we should be working together to restore our economy, our lives and not be divided.

[Translation]

In closing, I want to thank the vast majority of Canadians who have followed the guidelines throughout the whole pandemic. Thank you to those who made sacrifices to get us this far. Thank you to the Canadians who put their neighbours first and got vaccinated.

[English]

Thank you to all those who went to work, kept our hospitals and health systems going in the most difficult of times, those who kept food on our tables and our children learning, either at school or at home. I really want to thank our front-line workers who have cared for us through this ordeal. We are indebted to you.

I also want to pay a heartfelt tribute to the police who have undertaken a complex initiative these past days with care, honesty, transparency and professionalism. I applaud the many forces from various parts of the country that have joined together to make our capital ours again. While I’m sad that we need this motion, I am supporting it. Thank you.

Hon. Percy Downe: Honourable senators, as we consider the Emergencies Act currently before the Senate, it’s clear that the federal government, which invoked the act, and the Parliament of Canada, which is voting on its passage or rejection, was forced into this position by the inaction of the Ottawa city council.

I had the pleasure of living in Ottawa for several years in the 1990s. We owned a house here, paid our taxes here and sent our children to school here. I can tell you that Ottawa is a lovely city. That’s why what was allowed to happen here over the last few weeks is so disappointing.

I hope the citizens of Ottawa pay close attention to whom they are electing to their city council this fall. I hope they elect city councillors who have the ability to learn about the Police Services Act and who show the ability to grow into their job and the responsibility that it entails. I hope they elect individuals who are more interested in putting in the work to do the job rather than their personal popularity or their media profile. Our national capital needs a much improved and substantially more competent city council. We don’t want another dysfunctional Ottawa city council putting our country in this position again.

The question before us, colleagues, is as follows: Was there a lack of proper laws resulting in the need for the Emergencies Act, or was there a lack of enforcement of existing laws? The hands-off treatment of the protesters here in Ottawa motivated others to take similar action as blockades and protests started popping up at border crossings across Canada.

After reading the act, I had a number of questions. First and foremost of which was: Is the Emergencies Act necessary, or is it an overreach? The main question and the heart of the matter is the section of the act that states that to declare an emergency requires a situation that, “. . . cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.”

Unfortunately, that question may be impossible to answer, at least for the time being, simply because we don’t know what we don’t know. What have our security and intelligence agencies discovered about who was behind these very well-organized protests? Were foreign governments involved in providing support or funding in order to generate unrest and division in our country?

When I worked in the Prime Minister’s office, I spent a good deal of time working on national security issues after the September 2001 attack in the United States. We can assume the federal government assessed the threats and acted accordingly when they declared a public order emergency. And we will be able to confirm that assumption, or determine that the government made a mistake, when we review the implementation of the Emergencies Act over the next few months. However, the seizure of weapons at the Coutts border crossing in Alberta, along with the laying of charges involving uttering threats, possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose and conspiracy to commit murder are obviously extremely serious.

Colleagues, we must remember that the people who protested for three weeks represent but a small portion of the population of Canada. The silent majority of Canadians are those who are fully vaccinated — over 85% of eligible Canadians. The silent majority of Canadians followed public health guidelines. The silent majority of Canadians worked hard to protect their fellow citizens: our seniors, children under five, those with an autoimmune disorder and those who, for whatever reason, cannot receive the vaccine. However, a small group of our fellow citizens kept asking, “What about me?” It was all about me, me, me, and to heck with everyone else.

The current and ongoing easing of public health restrictions is because so many Canadians have done and continue to do the right thing. We owe a debt of gratitude to health care workers and public health officials who have guided us through this pandemic.

As I stated, because of the failure of early, effective enforcement, the Emergencies Act became necessary to prevent a well-organized, well-funded minority from overthrowing all the efforts that the majority of Canadians have undertaken to help us get through these past two painful and difficult years of the pandemic.

I shall be voting in favour of the motion. Thank you, honourable senators.

[Translation]

Hon. Denise Batters: Honourable senators, I rise to speak to this Emergencies Act motion. What a sad day it is, honourable senators, that it has come to this, that this Trudeau government has invoked and employed the Emergencies Act on Canadian citizens before it could even be voted on in Parliament. Tear gas and batons and lines of police to shove back protesters chanting for freedom. Truck windows smashed, bank accounts frozen, promises to hunt down even those who chose to leave the protest voluntarily. Even now, with the bridge blockades and Ottawa’s protest cleared, the Prime Minister can’t tell us when the Emergencies Act and its extensive government powers will be lifted, only that his government plans to make some of the features of those extensive powers permanent.

The incredible division among Canadians in this moment is largely of Prime Minister Trudeau’s own making. He and his government have divided Canadians among themselves, vaccinated and unvaccinated, and through his incendiary language turned them on one another. From the time of the election onwards, Prime Minister Trudeau has used this public health emergency as a political wedge issue, without regard for the Canadians in the middle who have become collateral damage.

He has called them extremists, racists and says they are misogynists. Prime Minister Trudeau preaches tolerance, but says those who choose not to be vaccinated against COVID-19 “take up room” and questions, “Do we tolerate these people?” And when these Canadians — in many cases being people who have lost much or everything as a result of COVID-19 mandates — land on Parliament’s doorstep to have their voices heard, what does the Prime Minister do? Instead of hearing them out or empathizing with the frustration they are feeling, he doubles down and called them a “fringe minority with unacceptable views.” So each side dug in and we wound up with a three-week protest in front of Parliament and the unnecessary overreach of the Emergencies Act by this government.

Let us not forget it was Prime Minister Trudeau who counselled Indian Prime Minister Modi to engage in dialogue when 50,000 farmers blockaded the roads to New Delhi in 2020, a protest that went on for a year. Prime Minister Trudeau boasted, “Canada will always be there to defend the right of peaceful protest.” Yet he has refused from the get-go to engage in dialogue with the blue-collar people who were demonstrating right here on Wellington Street.

Honourable senators, throughout this pandemic, we have been fortunate to still collect our paycheques, to maintain access to our health plans and other benefits and to be able to work remotely from the comfort of our homes when necessary. Many of the people living downtown in this public service city have also been fortunate. But there are other Canadians who have had a very different experience during this pandemic. Many have lost their jobs, their businesses and their livelihoods, some as the result of circumstances, others due to vaccine mandates. The financial loss, social isolation and vilification promoted by the government have all resulted in a growing frustration that has culminated in the trucker convoy and blockades we’ve seen across the country.

In Saskatchewan and Alberta where many of these truckers came from, people were already suffering economic devastation prior to this pandemic because of the anti-energy policies of the Trudeau government. The ever-ballooning carbon tax is a further burden. Meanwhile, the oil and gas industry has been vilified in this country. Only last week in B.C. we saw protesters violently attack the Coastal GasLink pipeline work camp with axes and terrorize workers, and certainly with no discussion of invoking the Emergencies Act in response from the government.

While this movement started from a place of resistance to vaccine mandates, it quickly expanded to become about freedom more generally. The more the government and the Prime Minister in Ottawa spoke divisively against the protesters, demonizing them and refusing to listen, the wider and more expansive the movement became.

Before I go too much further, let me be clear. I empathize with the residents of downtown Ottawa who have been most acutely affected by the protest here. They have had their lives and livelihoods disrupted. Understandably, they wanted it to end. This intrusion into their lives came at the tail end of having suffered through this pandemic, perhaps the most stressful and traumatic two years of many of our lives. And then to have to deal with this? The blaring horns at all hours of the day and night, the obstruction — who among us wouldn’t be saying enough is enough?

My office faces right onto Wellington Street, and I had a front-row seat to this convoy for the past few weeks. I can tell you that what I witnessed of the protesters was peaceful, organized and non-threatening. I do not tolerate harassment, intimidation or destruction ever, but I can honestly say that I personally did not see any of that behaviour exhibited by the protesters. I have been here in Ottawa during all three weeks of the protest, and I can say that in the last two years, I never felt safer walking home from my office at night. The protesters I met very much reminded me of the people I know in Saskatchewan — friendly, hard-working, patriotic Canadians. But I sensed in the discussions about the protesters in the media and among the privileged, chattering classes on Parliament Hill almost a fear of these working-class people who had invaded the city. Ottawa’s mayor called them yahoos and idiots. Others online maligned them as Nazis and terrorists. Everyone had an opinion about them, but certainly no one was talking with them.

It was widely reported that I posed in a photograph at the protest alongside my MP caucus colleagues from Saskatchewan during the protest’s first week. There were no protesters in the photo. There was an empty truck in the background with Saskatchewan flags on it. Certainly, nothing offensive. But in the Ottawa media this was considered controversial. We went to talk to some of the Saskatchewan truckers who congregated on Kent Street from towns like Stoughton, Southey, Carievale, Carnduff and Birch Hills. These truckers are our constituents, and it is our job as parliamentarians to hear them out, to engage with those we represent and to listen to their concerns. They drove all the way to Ottawa from those Saskatchewan towns — Birch Hills is almost 3,000 kilometres, or a 32-hour drive, away — to simply have a conversation. Like Prime Minister Trudeau will advise other world leaders to do, but which he obstinately refused to do himself when faced with the same situation here in Canada’s capital, like so many other situations, what this Prime Minister sanctimoniously prescribes for others he refuses to apply for himself.

To be sure, the Emergencies Act is intense legislation for a government to invoke. It should only be used as a last resort when no other laws can deal with a national security-threatening issue effectively. I submit that this Ottawa convoy falls well short of that bar. In the past, when this act — or more accurately, its precursor, the War Measures Act — was invoked, it was in relation to World War I, World War II and the FLQ crisis, which involved the murder and kidnapping of public officials and ongoing terrorist activities. These are the only times similar legislation was employed in the past. What is the national emergency this time? Dance parties and loud horns? Horns that, by the way, had long since stopped honking by the time this act was invoked due to a court injunction that the truckers complied with.

Honourable senators, just remember that when this government is long gone and another takes its place of a stripe you may not agree with. The Trudeau government has now set this as the precedent for invoking the Emergencies Act. Bouncy castles, loud horns, raucous partying and illegal parking in a four-block radius of downtown Ottawa. It’s annoying, to be sure. But is this a national emergency?

The federal government made no moves to resolve the Ottawa protest for three weeks, while the protesters were mere feet from the front doors of the West Block. If the situation were truly such a grave threat to national security that it rose to the level of employing the Emergencies Act, one would expect the federal government would have acted in some way — any way — to resolve it. But they did not. Prime Minister Trudeau simply refused to meet with protesters, then brought in the Emergencies Act as a first, not a last, resort.

When Deputy Prime Minister Freeland spoke on the issue, she said that the government used all the tools it had prior to the invocation of the act. What tools? Name calling? The Prime Minister disappearing for days on end? More name calling? What tools? The same tools they used for the railway blockades in 2020 that went on for 19 days, and for which the government still never invoked the Emergencies Act?

When the Prime Minister announced that he was engaging the Emergencies Act, he told Canadians it would be in a geographically targeted way, applicable only to those within the zones specified. Yet, we see in reality the federal government’s massive overreach in the proclamation declaring a public order emergency, which states that the public order emergency will apply “throughout Canada.”

Several of the premiers oppose the use of the Emergencies Act to deal with this situation, including the Premier Scott Moe of my home province of Saskatchewan.

Many legal experts agree this situation fails to meet the threshold for exercising the Emergencies Act. Among them are constitutional law Professor Dwight Newman, Advocates for the Rule of Law, Amnesty International, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the BC Civil Liberties Association, and even Paul Champ, the lawyer for those who successfully sought the court injunction against the horn honking of the Ottawa protest. They all agree this situation didn’t require the Emergencies Act.

Last week, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association announced that it is taking the government of Canada to court over the invocation of this act. The CCLA’s Executive Director Noa Mendelsohn Aviv called the use of the Emergencies Act in this unprecedented situation and a serious infringement of the Charter rights of Canadians. She stated that, by invoking the Emergencies Act, the government would be giving itself “. . . enormous powers to bypass the ordinary, accountable democratic process.” Mendelsohn went on to call “peaceful assembly,” which by any measure this protest has been, “a critical democratic tool.”

The BC Civil Liberties Association has further pointed out that the Emergencies Act should not be a stopgap measure to address the inaction of municipal police forces and provincial authorities. To be clear, they stated, governments have ample legal authorities without using the Emergencies Act.

Even Paul Champ, the Ottawa lawyer who went to court to put a halt to the incessant honking of horns by the truckers, agrees that the use of the Emergencies Act in this situation was government overreach.

. . . although I am acutely aware of the trauma experienced by Ottawa residents, I fully agree that the Emergencies Act is a dangerous tool that was not required.

Many legal experts shared a concern that by invoking the Emergencies Act for the Ottawa protest, the Trudeau government is normalizing the extraordinary law’s usage.

The BCCLA warns that the invocation of the act in this instance sets a dangerous precedent if our elected officials become comfortable with using excessive powers to target dissent in Canada. It becomes easier to use again, they argue, to stifle other movements such as Black Lives Matter or Indigenous land and water defenders.

Advocates for the Rule of Law, or ARL, agree that this situation sets a dangerous precedent:

. . . normalizing the declaration of emergencies, especially before other less intrusive (but still significant) measures have been attempted, threatens to render hollow the rights and freedoms guaranteed to all Canadians; it risks a gradual erosion of Parliament’s role in favour of executive power; and it amounts to a damning admission of a failure of state capacity.

But there is some evidence that normalizing emergencies may be the Trudeau government’s intention. Deputy Prime Minister Freeland has recently spoken of making some tools in the act permanent. We should all be worried about that, honourable senators.

For all its raucousness and disruption of traffic in downtown Ottawa, can anyone seriously believe this protest was a threat to Canada’s national security? Some will say that it spawned blockades at the Ambassador Bridge, disrupting one of our main trade routes with the United States. But that blockade and, similarly, the one in Alberta, were dispersed peacefully and nonviolently. And most importantly, without recourse to the Emergencies Act.

Meanwhile, both houses of Parliament were able to meet for weeks, mere steps away from the protesters. Prime Minister Trudeau and his senior cabinet ministers attended several Question Periods and House of Commons sittings in the West Block in person. If there was a true public order emergency, surely none of that would have been allowed to have occurred.

Honourable senators, consider all the moments of crisis in Canada since 1988 — and yet, the Emergencies Act was not invoked for any of those occasions; not for the standoff at Oka, not for 9/11 in which 25 Canadians were killed and not even during the October 2014 Parliament Hill shooting — and I remember that well, because I was locked in a caucus room for 10 hours with my colleagues throughout. None of those situations required the use of the Emergencies Act.

I fear that with this invocation, we are embarking on a slippery slope away from what Canada is famous for: its unwavering adherence to the principles of freedom and justice. These principles are why immigrants from around the world long to come to Canada. That is the reason so many of our ancestors came here, to escape tyranny. That is why my grandparents came to Canada from Ukraine 100 years ago. This country, this parliamentary system — the Westminster System — was founded out of the rejection of tyranny. The Fathers of Confederation feared not just the tyranny of the monarch but the tyranny of the majority, and we in the Senate are a key part of that system to stand up for the minority, to be their voice.

It has not been lost on me, nor should it be on any of you, that this building, now the Senate of Canada Building, where I deliver this speech today, is the very building where your Charter of Rights and Freedoms was negotiated. Think of that history, honourable senators, when you consider whether to allow this federal government to trample all over that Charter.

People on both sides of the political spectrum have expressed the view that the Trudeau government’s invocation of the Emergencies Act in this situation is considerable government overreach, and at this time I am reminded of the words of William F. Buckley Jr., who said, “The best defence against usurpatory government is an assertive citizenry.”

We need to assert ourselves, honourable senators, and reject this unprecedented authoritarian overreach by this federal government. Please join me in voting no to this Emergencies Act motion. Thank you.

Hon. Brent Cotter: Honourable senators, I want to begin by thanking colleagues for their deep and thoughtful remarks in this debate, even when we disagree.

I’m going to be speaking in support of the declaration, and I want to speak to three aspects of the issues. The first is personal, the second I would call decisional and the third institutional.

The personal. In the fall of 1970, I was in my final year of business school in Saskatoon. On a Saturday evening in late October, I attended a party at somebody’s house. As I arrived at the party, there was a group of six or eight young men, nearly all of them business school classmates, engaged in a heated discussion with one other person. The business school group was supporting the imposition of the War Measures Act in Quebec, the need to get lawlessness under control, and if a few rights got trampled in the process, a small price to pay.

The one other person was a law student. He patiently made his case to the effect that people were more than the sum of their economic parts, that they are sentient beings with rights and obligations that are the essence of who we are as humans.

I stood at the edge of this debate and listened. To be honest, I hadn’t thought much about these issues and human values. It was, for me, a life-changing moment. That eye-opening discussion was the single-most important influence in my decision to go to law school and begin a career in law. Rights and laws and the rule of law have come to matter a lot to me.

In a remarkable way, that moment and the influence of that law student, Henry Kloppenburg, now a brilliant, principled, courageous and somewhat eccentric Saskatoon lawyer, set me on a career path that brings me to this moment and probably the most important decision today that I will make in my professional life.

Now to what I will call the decisional. I won’t speak about Charter of Rights issues, but I would associate myself with the remarks of others, including Senator McPhedran, on this point. On the decisional, I think it is important to remove from consideration in our discussion and decision the argument that if something had been done earlier and better, we wouldn’t be in this fix. And therefore, we are entitled to withhold approbation of the emergency declaration. I agree that various actions by various actors could have been averted and moderated this crisis, but that is not the test today. It is, having gotten to where we are, is this declaration a reasonable course to be taken?

Here is another way of looking at it. Many have written that wiser decisions taken in 1919 or 1935 or early in 1939 might have averted World War II. Well, tragically they weren’t. But can you imagine if we were exercising this emergency power in 1939, we would have said that because somebody else did a lousy job averting war earlier, we would not join the war effort in 1939? To ask the question is to answer it.

On the question of a threshold for deciding, I’ve read widely the case of those who assert the threshold has not been met and the case of those, including the cabinet, who assert that it has. I have some background on these questions, but to be better informed I retained a distinguished constitutional law expert, Professor Wayne MacKay, to advise me. He’s a professor emeritus at the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie in Halifax. In so doing, he identified 12 features, features of concern, that take us into the realm of national emergency. Virtually every single one of them has been mentioned in the debate today.

Nearly all of these are related to unlawful conduct. Some of this conduct could unquestionably have been addressed using existing powers, but much of it, particularly in Ottawa, could not have been achieved, certainly not without much more serious adverse consequences than actually occurred, and that’s important.

I want to focus primarily on the situation in the nation’s capital. I’m deeply troubled by this. We have seen protests in Ottawa before. They have been, for me, a sign of the health of our democracy. We have to get back to that state as soon as we possibly can. And I’m fine with people coming to Ottawa to protest in favour of courses of action that are unrealistic or legally impossible — say the removal of the Prime Minister by the Governor General and the Senate. But I’ve never seen protests of the like that we’ve seen over the last month where protesters transitioned their protests into an occupation of the centre of our nation’s capital and sought to leverage this illegal occupation to advance their various grievances but also, within some corners of that protest, some dark corners, to actually leverage the removal of the government by other than legal and constitutional means.

And exactly where was this illegal occupation occurring? Within metres of the beating heart of our national democracy and within metres of the office of the Prime Minister of our country.

Equally compelling for me in this argument is what happened when the emergency orders were exercised. One was the designation of the area around Parliament as essentially a no-go zone. Given where things had evolved to earlier last week, gaining control of this part of Ottawa effectively and with as little conflict as possible could only have occurred through the special powers conveyed by the regulations.

Second was the pressure put on the physical assets of protesters that coerced many to withdraw from the no-go zone, either with or without their trucks and other property.

Third was the use of the special authority to block a number of protesters’ access to funds which would otherwise have prolonged the occupation.

Lastly, I do not discount the benefit of expediting police actions, particularly in the rapid development of strategies that were exceptionally effective, professional and respectful of the rights of even the most difficult citizens, as Senator Plett and others have observed.

I’ve been involved in police oversight for nearly a decade. I have never seen such disciplined and effective policing in my life. I would add that there’s lots of blame to go around in this crisis, and public confidence is rightly shaken, but one upside is that the public confidence and pride in our law enforcement brothers and sisters has been greatly enhanced in this country.

I note that the police and police leaders, whom we have rightly praised in this chamber, have virtually universally stated that the authorities conferred by the declaration were necessary to resolve the crisis. In that respect, it seems unfair on the one hand to praise them and their efforts and then, on the other hand, to disregard their heartfelt and professional judgments of what these authorities needed.

Here is what is most compelling to me. These powers made it possible for the law enforcement officers to gain control and resolve this crisis in the safest and most honourable way possible, using these tools they said they needed and then used to do their jobs in ways that made all of us proud.

When all of this is added together, it satisfies me that the case has been made for the invocation of the emergency declaration.

Now to the institutional question, essentially how we should look at, how we should think about, our authority if we are to exercise it honourably. I want to make five points.

The first is about the Emergencies Act itself. Unlike the War Measures Act, it is a product of extremely careful modern thought — not perfect, as people have noted, but infinitely superior to its predecessor. I observed the work of the Mulroney government in 1988, and special credit goes to the Justice minister of the time, then Justice minister Ramon Hnatyshyn, a decent, fair-minded, much admired, even revered, son of Saskatchewan. The government put in place remarkable safeguards that were previously non-existent. I won’t repeat them here; I think you’ve come to know them well. They are remarkable, powerful, though imperfect, accountabilities.

My second point is that when we apply our minds to the use of this authority, I think the question for us is this: Was the decision of the cabinet a reasonable one, not necessarily the correct or even the best one but one of a reasonable range of decisions in the circumstances?

My third point in support of this is that the test for reasonableness seems to me to be a compelling one. We are essentially reviewing an administrative decision taken by the cabinet of our country. When this is done, provided the basic tests are met, the circumstances usually call for a significant degree of deference owed to the decision-making body. A common one to justify that is that the decision maker has special expertise. In our situation, I would not go so far as to say that a cabinet, any cabinet, has special expertise, but it often has more information available to it than we do. Here I think I am inclined to join the discussion of a couple of senators earlier on this question. Senator Lankin raised this question earlier as well.

Some of that information is not available to us and probably, in this context, should not be. To my mind, this has a certain equivalence to special expertise that is owed deference.

Here I’m not saying anything about this particular cabinet. It is a point regarding the institution of cabinet. Indeed, I would have made some decisions differently if it had been me, but the entity of the cabinet, any cabinet, is entitled to this deference, which in decisional terms means that we should support a decision that is in the range of reasonable decisions, of which I think this was one.

The fourth point relates to who we are. We are, by section 58(7) of the Emergencies Act, given co-equal authority with regard to the review of the emergency declaration, which we are doing now. This is a great power. The greater the power, the greater the responsibility we have to exercise it in a principled way. In this context, I want to make a few short points.

First, we are exercising a democratically granted authority. Secondly, a significant majority of the people in this country who are part of that democracy support the issuance of this declaration. This is not always determinative. We have duties that often cause us not to be bent by the will of the majority, but it is noteworthy in democracy terms. Third, a majority of the elected representatives in that other place have voted to support the declaration. This does not require us to do so as well, but it does encourage deference to the country’s democratic values, which we hold dear.

If we reach a different decision and revoke this declaration, we must be very clear in our minds. We must be convinced not only that the issuance of the declaration was incorrect, but that it was not even within a range of reasonable decisions this government could have made. Anything less is a failure of sober second thought, essentially a usurpation of democratic decision making.

That is related to my fifth and final point, what I would call consequential. I think we are all agreed, whether there is or is not sympathy for protesting occupiers, that much of their actions were illegal, and in some quarters the goal was to displace the sitting government through other than democratic means.

Many have observed within this chamber and in the other place and elsewhere that a vote on this emergency declaration is the equivalent of a confidence vote. I recognize Senator Dalphond’s observations, but I think we can say that this is an unbelievably serious decision for us to be taking. I don’t think we’re in the business, in this house, of confidence votes, but if we vote to revoke the declaration, it will have virtually the same effect or message. We, as a non-elected body, may well be creating the conditions that bring an end to this government. By doing so, we may well then achieve for the most seditious of the occupiers, exactly what, through their illegal occupation of our country’s capital, they most devoutly sought.

If you are inclined to revoke the emergency declaration, I urge you to give all of these implications very serious thought.

I would go further. It will invite questions in many quarters, perhaps more so than have ever occurred, regarding the legitimacy of this very institution. If we take this path, people are sure to begin asking of us not just who we are, but who do we think we are. Thank you.

Hon. Peter M. Boehm: Honourable senators, I rise to speak in favour of the motion before us today. It is my view that our country is dealing with a public order emergency that unfortunately requires the use of extraordinary and temporary measures.

What Ottawa, and indeed Canada, has been through the past month is unprecedented in our history. The combination of border blockades, the illegal occupation of a city — let alone our capital — the harassment and threats of violence against residents and journalists and the damage to businesses and our economic security — to say nothing of the explicit end goal of some of toppling our duly elected government — is not normal.

Protests and even riots are not abnormal in Canada. Quite the opposite: There were riots during the conscription crises in both world wars; the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919; the On to Ottawa Trek of 1935 and the subsequent Regina Riot. Montreal even saw riots in 1885 over, you guessed it, vaccines — smallpox at the time.

And, of course, there was the October Crisis of 1970 and Oka 20 years later. More recently there have been protests and blockades which have sometimes turned violent against pipelines and other projects. Some have been associated with major world events that Canada was hosting. I dealt with examples of this in my previous career, beginning with the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City in April 2001.

Protest is a fundamental element of any functional democracy, Canada included. It is a right we all hold dear and one that must be protected. Here’s the problem, though: What happened in Ottawa was no mere protest. It was an occupation, and it certainly was not peaceful. I realize this is where opinion becomes sharply divided, but the absence of outright physical violence is not peace.

Particularly over the weekend during law enforcement operations in downtown Ottawa, we heard and read striking terms, including “front line,” “occupied territory,” and “gaining and losing ground.” This is usually reserved for dispatches from war zones. It is not how actions to disperse legitimately peaceful protests are described. This leads me to the War Measures Act used in October 1970. Then, as now, parliamentarians decried the perceived government overreach. This is much the same situation the current government faced in making what was no doubt a very difficult decision.

However, a major difference today is that unlike in 1970, the federal government does not have unlimited powers to restore order, and the Canadian military has not been deployed to city streets, something that shocked all Canadians, especially residents of Quebec over 51 years ago. As we all know, the War Measures Act was later repealed and, in 1988, was replaced by the current Emergencies Act by the government of Brian Mulroney at the time.

I wish to justify my support for this motion by addressing three areas: the applicability of the act, my personal understanding of freedom and my views as an Ottawa resident.

First, I accept that the threshold for the invocation of the act has been met. If what we are dealing with is not a public order emergency, I don’t know what is.

The blockades at international bridges caused tremendous and perhaps long-lasting damage not only to our economy in pure numbers but also to Canada’s reputation as a safe, engaged trading partner and investment destination.

Jobs are at stake. What the blockades in Windsor, Ontario, Coutts, Alberta, Emerson, Manitoba, and South Surrey, British Columbia had in common, on the surface, was an opposition to vaccine mandates ostensibly for truckers — that very small percentage that believes vaccine mandates impinge on their freedom.

The same goes for Ottawa. What the blockades and the occupation of Ottawa demonstrate is that the sentiments expressed suggest a national problem, not one confined to a specific region or city.

The blockades and occupation of Ottawa, however, are not just about vaccine mandates, if that was ever really the point.

Groups with deeper grievances, ranging from dissatisfaction with governments generally — particularly at the federal level — an unwillingness to accept the results of the last federal election, a general frustration with how two years of pandemic and health control measures have impacted their lives and, quite frankly, a wish to raise a little hell.

Mis- and even disinformation, particularly on social media, has added fuel to the fire and some of it has been spread by malign actors. This is to say nothing of crowdfunding, much of it foreign, a phenomenon we have not before seen in Canada at this level.

Further, some protesters were prepared to engage in violence. This was particularly clear in Coutts, where RCMP uncovered a disturbing plot to kill officers along with a cache of weapons.

As I have said, protest is normal in this country and it is an important part of a healthy democracy. What is not normal is the blocking of critical infrastructure and holding a city and its residents hostage for several weeks.

Based on their analysis, the Ottawa Police Service and the Ontario Provincial Police concluded they could not bring the occupation to a safe and effective end with their own resources and under their municipal and provincial mandates.

The immediate situation in Ottawa was largely resolved, according to our police forces, due to the invocation of the act because it allows for greater police cooperation across the country without swearing-in procedures and the time-consuming establishment of other protocols.

For me, the sobering thought is that such blockades, occupations and demonstrations could recur at any time. Just because the streets of downtown Ottawa are now largely clear of demonstrators and trucks does not mean the danger is over.

The use of the Emergencies Act, while I support it in this instance, is a Band-Aid, not a cure. We must remember that, colleagues.

This legislation was designed with full deference to the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms as a last resort to deal with different types of emergencies.

I will not delve into the detail that others have already offered except to say that there are serious checks and balances. They are meant to ensure that the government is held accountable by Parliament and the public and can neither maintain the declaration of emergency indefinitely nor for its own purposes.

I would further point out that it would be quite challenging for a minority government to veer into authoritarianism despite what we have heard from so many critics.

Colleagues, like all of you, I heard and read what demonstrators in Ottawa had to say. They said they wanted freedom or they wanted it back or they were fighting for bodily autonomy. Their list of complaints was long and many of their slogans were American imports — for example, “Don’t tread on me” and “Live free or die.” Others would not exactly fall under parliamentary language as we know it.

Even some of the flags were imported from other places and times. It is upsetting to have to say that Confederate and Nazi flags have no place in Canada. In my view, neither do upside‑down Canadian flags at our cenotaph, which is what I saw outside my office window.

Demonstrators made their points. They complained very loudly and were heard. It was impossible not to hear them. These people, despite their assertions that they have unified the country as never before, are not the majority they claim to be.

Over 80% of Canadians have complied with mandates, have been vaccinated and have learned about QR codes knowing they were doing this for their health and safety and for the common good of all citizens.

Surely, in this great country we have learned throughout our history that our social contract means we sometimes must make sacrifices to safeguard our society and protect each other. This is why we have laws and public health measures and why we pay taxes. The social contract we all sign on to by virtue of citizenship and residence in Canada is not rendered void because some people do not like it.

That is also why we have the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, an important document that more Canadians should read. I must point out here that it is the Charter by which we abide in Canada, not the United States Constitution.

Colleagues, Canada has come through this latest pandemic with one of the highest vaccination rates in the world and one of the lowest COVID-related death rates. Why? Because Canadians and our federal, provincial and municipal governments all worked together. Yes, there were some coordination issues, especially in the first dark days, but they were largely overcome. And those who did not and still do not wish to be vaccinated made their choice.

In Canada, our mission since 1867 has been peace, order and good government. For the most part, we have fulfilled the goals of that ongoing project. It is part of what Canada is known for in the international community.

In my previous career, it was part of my job in the service of both Conservative and Liberal governments to promote and defend human rights and freedom in various parts of the world. I have many stories; I’ll give you one short one.

While a junior diplomat stationed in Central America, I recall arriving late one evening at the airport in El Salvador while that country was engaged in civil war. I took a taxi down the deserted highway to the capital, San Salvador, and was soon pulled over by a military platoon asking for my credentials.

Surprise was expressed that I did not have a security detail — I am a Canadian after all — but then the commanding officer said that everyone liked Canadians because they stood for freedom. “By the way,” he told me, “my sister lives in Toronto.”

I was warned to be careful because there were reports of a unit of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, or FMLN in Spanish, a few kilometres up the road. Sure enough, members of the guerilla group intercepted me and my now nervous taxi driver some time later. Credentials were again shown, this time to the self-described freedom fighters. I was asked to pose for a photo with the group, which the leader said he would send to his sister who was living in freedom in Vancouver. He then said we should be very careful because there was an army column nearby. The driver and I just looked at each other.

Colleagues, people all over the world have come to Canada to find and live in freedom, my own parents and some members of the Senate included. This will continue despite the concerted efforts of many to besmirch, denigrate, fundraise or even derive partisan political gain from the word “freedom.”

Colleagues, I’m a resident of Ottawa and for the past few weeks I’ve walked to work every day. It was the easiest way for me to get to my office in the Chambers building. From the moment I would open my front door at home to arriving at my office some 40 minutes later, I heard the truck horns, usually in one continuous blast. I walked past shuttered businesses, past the closed Rideau Centre, the sixth-largest mall in Canada, I believe, and through the fumes emanating from illegally parked, idling trucks downtown and in the Parliamentary Precinct.

I spoke with protesters. I spoke with their children. It is not the only example of this, but I personally saw from a distance demonstrators carry out a racist and deeply offensive parody of an Indigenous ceremony.

Other senators and I have received countless emails and phone calls from Canadians, and from some Americans too, asking us to vote against this motion and also asking us, in many instances, to bring down the government.

I have received many communications as well from residents of this city who are simply trying to live their lives in peace. They were scared and they were, and are, angry. I am too on my own and on their behalf.

Residents have been harassed for wearing masks. They have been subjected to racist and misogynistic comments — and no amount of “but that’s just a few bad apples” makes this less unacceptable.

Seniors and people with disabilities who rely on meal deliveries, such as Meals on Wheels, have been impacted by blocked streets. People have worried, with good reason, about their residences being attacked. There was public urination and defecation even on the sacred ground of the National War Memorial.

There was a sense, again with very good reason, that the rules did not apply to the occupiers — and worse, they believed it as well. There was a loss of public trust, no small matter in municipal authorities, including the Ottawa Police Service, beleaguered as they were. There was a decrease in mental and physical health as a result of this occupation, and a deep concern of the impact of all of this on children and even on pets.

All of this leads me to have great concern for members of our dedicated Senate staff, as other senators have mentioned — those in our offices and in the Senate Administration — who live downtown and in Centretown. Check in with them, colleagues. See if they’re okay.

Colleagues, no matter how many inquiries are undertaken under whatever levels of government, this event has marked the lives of Ottawans forever. In fact, it is one that impacts all Canadians, even those who live nowhere near here.

The use of the federal Emergencies Act and the long-term implications of doing so on our national psyche make that clear. We know there are people across the country who see Ottawans as entitled and who did not want the convoy to leave the city, people who were happy to show their explicit support for the demonstrators and their goals. They will need to reflect on comments made and actions taken.

It is not just the supporters of the demonstrations in Ottawa and the blockades across the country who need to reflect. Every single Canadian must. How we respond in this moment will have effects not just now but into the future. This is not just a debate on the use of the Emergencies Act in this specific situation. It is a debate on what we want this great country of ours to stand for. Thank you.

Hon. Kim Pate: Honourable senators, I also rise as someone who has the privilege and responsibility of living and working in the unceded, unsurrendered territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe.

Colleagues, all indication is that the urgent situation of the past weeks could have been prevented. The occupation of the streets of Ottawa did not begin as an emergency. It became one because of inaction and intransigence by all levels of government and was shaped, in particular, by systemic racism, misogyny and bias in state attitudes, including among law enforcement, as well as apparent feelings of overdue reckoning and unification of people who have long been left behind, many of whom have experienced victimization, criminalization and institutionalization by those same state authorities.

While many of us were stopped and questioned on the road, trucks were permitted to roll in and lay siege to the nation’s capital. This, even though public authorities had advance intelligence of the involvement of violent extremists. It is clear White supremacist, populist, racist, xenophobic discriminatory objectives filled the hearts and minds of key organizers and those who bankrolled and emboldened them to promote hatred.

What is also clear is that many ordinary people, whose needs and interests have been intentionally ignored by successive governments, were engaged by calls for freedom and an end to autocratic, unfair and unaccountable decision making.

I am beyond heartbroken that communities and families are being pitted against each other, that people I know and love are among those here, across the country and in other nations who, after decades of disenfranchisement and abandonment by health, economic and social systems, think they have found common cause.

These emergency measures may end the blockades and occupations, but they will not redress the inequalities, disenfranchisement and divisions that these actions reinforced and exacerbated. If we actually hope to end and prevent such insurrection, we must, crucially, work to ensure that the most dispossessed and marginalized are no longer left behind. We must prioritize equality, dignity, fairness and justice for all.

Years before Parliament Hill became my workplace, on the Centre Block protest grounds and beyond, I organized and participated in countless demonstrations and protests aimed to disrupt and raise concerns about inequities and grievances from anti-poverty to anti-war, pro-choice, anti-racism, anti-violence against women, support for missing and murdered Indigenous women, anti-heterosexist, anti-fascist, anti-capitalist, environmental, women, Indigenous, Black Lives Matter actions. The list goes on.

The purpose of protest is to disrupt and get change. The purpose is to create action. Unlike this occupation, prior to the wielding of the legal sledgehammer of the Emergencies Act, the full force of the law was often swiftly employed to subdue, suppress and squash lawful and peaceful protest. It certainly was not the norm to have law enforcement and conservative interests joining, posing for group photos, or urging us on and partying with us.

As the convoy arrived in Ottawa, police were already present on the roads. Driving to my office on January 28 and beyond, I was stopped, questioned and urged not to proceed, only to then watch trucks being waved through as they drove onto Parliament Hill.

We now know that Canada’s Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre warned the federal government days before the siege that violent extremist groups were deeply involved and that the scale of the protests would be a “trigger point and opportunity for potential lone actor attackers to conduct a terrorism attack.” Why did authorities not take this threat seriously?

Homeless people trying to survive in encampments, Indigenous peoples protecting their lands and waters, Black Lives Matter protesters, women, environmentalists, striking workers and countless others have too often faced state use of force and even brutality and violence when exercising their rights to peaceful assembly. I cannot imagine any of these groups being permitted by law enforcement to drive multiple vehicles, much less 18-wheelers, onto Parliament Hill.

By contrast, those occupying Ottawa were granted incredible leeway to move flammable liquids and heavy vehicles through heavily populated areas and to harass, bully and threaten people, including front-line workers, health and retail workers, service providers, residents and homeless folks.

Police claim that they have received few official complaints — this after advising Ottawa residents seeking assistance that they could not intervene, that people should shelter at home, remove their masks when challenged by occupiers, or consider temporarily leaving their homes in the downtown area. Counter-protesters who confronted trucks reported being approached by police to negotiate safe passage of the convoy, including being asked, “If you don’t move, how does this end?”

All of this reflects the racism, misogyny and bias long identified in policing, corrections, the military and, in some respects, the government, whereby some are privileged with protection and others are at best abandoned and at worst allowed to be brutalized. In a context where every state authority is being investigated for failure to address class, race and gender bias, the reluctance of individuals to report such actions is not only understandable but should be expected.

Honourable senators, how comfortable would you be pushing authorities, some of whom you see posing for selfies and otherwise endorsing the individuals you fear? How do you know which officers are the ones who will act professionally and fairly versus those who may not? The sense that police have stood by, condoned or even supported the occupation is, unfortunately, reinforced by the presence of former police, military and national security personnel among the organizers, funders and occupation participants.

Meanwhile, people living on the streets, people living below the poverty line, women, Indigenous peoples, African Canadians and other racialized people, those living with disabilities and members of the 2SLGBTQ community have disproportionately borne the consequences of the occupation, while simultaneously seeing that little has been done to address the root issues of the inequalities they endure.

At the same time, those experiencing financial, social and health insecurity have also been disproportionately drawn into the anti-government protests. Many joined the occupation because of distrust of the government and concerns about vaccines or COVID health measure mandates.

Decades of evisceration of our health care systems meant that governments turned to mandates to flatten the curve of demand for urgent health care. Small government focus on shrinking social, economic and health supports has resulted in massive inequalities. Canadians below the poverty line are twice as likely as more well-off Canadians to die of this virus. Pandemic policies have left the most marginalized behind.

The focus on health mandates has overshadowed the collective dimensions of health and reinforced individualistic responsibility for public health, rather than emphasizing collective obligations and the importance of government and business ensuring safe living and workplaces, paid sick days or equitable availability of health supplies and emergency supports.

Too many in Canada experience economic deprivation, uncertain if they will have the means to care for, feed and shelter themselves and their families. Across Canada, the number of visitors to one in every four food banks doubled last year during COVID.

Current policies leave those in the most precarious positions to fend for themselves, which is contributing to many being drawn to the populist messages.

These feelings of deprivation and abandonment were further intensified by the government refusal to dialogue, much less acknowledge, and attempt to understand the feelings and real concerns expressed by many ordinary people from across the country who are struggling to get by.

The government knew that protesters were coming to Ottawa, yet no attempt was made to intercept or address the issues being raised. While we certainly saw instances of extremism, racism, anti-Semitism and misogyny here on the Hill, should we really be calling all who oppose vaccine mandates racist and misogynists instead of trying to meaningfully understand and address underlying fears, anxiety and frustration?

CBC recently reported the story of a man from Saskatchewan, a farmer and father of two, who took part in a blockade of his provincial legislature. A volunteer firefighter, his mental health suffered after being a first responder to the bus crash that claimed the lives of members of the Humboldt Broncos hockey team. When a Workers’ Compensation Board denied him income supports, he reported that he really quit trusting other people to make decisions on his behalf. During the pandemic, he opted not to vaccinate himself or his two children.

He decided to join the protests, looking for “a sense of belonging” after witnessing the hurt experienced by his 12‑year‑old when their family was not allowed to go into a ski chalet to eat because they were unvaccinated. The man said he felt like they had been treated as if they were “dirty.” He acknowledged that some involved in the protests were “extremists,” but many were “ordinary, hard-working” people. He has heard reports of occupiers in Ottawa harassing a homeless shelter and displaying Confederate flags and swastikas but doesn’t trust the media and believes such stories were fabricated.

As highlighted by the work of the African-Canadian senators group and the Parliamentary Black Caucus and our Indigenous colleagues, despite frequent references to truckers and vaccine mandates, the organizers of the occupation are not tied to the trucking industry. They are linked to organizations espousing extremism, anti-democratic values, violence and White supremacy. They hope to benefit from the attention, recruit others to their cause and try to normalize hateful symbols and messages.

The emergency measures we are debating will not end people’s sense of disenfranchisement, distrust and anger. Indeed, they run the risk of further eroding trust in government by stigmatizing and further isolating those on the margins.

Responding meaningfully to this occupation means taking action against the hate speech that it has emboldened and which can prevent women, racialized people and many others from exercising their rights and participating in their communities. In the short term, the government could, for instance, reintroduce legislation from last Parliament to re-enact former section 13 of the Canadian Human Rights Act. This measure would allow advocates to file complaints about hate propaganda targeting specific communities that is likely to do significant harm.

Also, as human rights advocates like Monia Mazigh remind us:

Anti-terrorism legislation is not only unconstitutional it is useless in protecting public safety. It is time to repeal these laws and hold a public debate about the meaning of freedom. Instead of laws that curtail our civil liberties, we should reflect on the importance of respecting our human rights to ensure both our safety and our security.

Finally, on an urgent basis, we must also ensure that social, health and economic policies address the inequities that rig systems and abandon people in vital need of support to situations of crisis and vulnerability.

COVID-19 reminds us that none of us will be okay until all of us are okay. Safeguarding our health and well-being in this pandemic and beyond is necessarily a collective and inclusive, not an individual, endeavour. We cannot hope to protect ourselves from the effects of COVID if those around us lack the financial means and supports to similarly ensure their safety and well-being. Likewise, we cannot hope to counter disenfranchisement and division without plans for income, health and social equality that cease to leave people behind.

The protesting man from Saskatchewan, despite his distrust of the media, shared his story with CBC saying that, “. . . he believes more communication and understanding are needed” and he wants “us all to be friends after this (pandemic) is said and done.”

This is a goal I believe most Canadians share. We absolutely need to come together to address inequality and work to build an inclusive future. We need to build an inclusive Canada. Thank you, colleagues. Meegwetch, merci.

Hon. Yvonne Boyer: Honourable senators, I rise today during this historic debate. As I begin my speech, I would like to acknowledge that I’m speaking to you from the traditional and unceded territories of the Anishinaabe, Mississauga and Algonquin nations. The people of these nations are the original stewards of the land, and it is important to show our respect for their stewardship by acknowledging them every time and every day.

We are gathered here today to carry out what is at the core of our responsibility as senators: to act as a chamber of sober second thought and to bring the voices of those who are not heard or represented in government decision making to the forefront.

I support the government’s decision to take these unprecedented steps and implement the Emergencies Act. We are in an unprecedented situation, and action must be swift and ongoing to restore order and end the violence and unlawful blockades across Canada.

While I support this decision, I also support the great hesitation that was shown before enacting these powers. In that light, I caution this government and future governments about potential use of this act in the years to come. Invoking these powers was held to be a last resort by the government, and it must always be that way. Freedom of speech and freedom of assembly are critical rights. They must always be upheld and defended in this country. However, what we have seen over the last weeks is not this, and these actions must come to a complete stop.

Honourable senators, I would be remiss if I did not take this opportunity to acknowledge and shine a light on what is an undisputed fact in this country and across the world: the fact that Indigenous, Black, other people of colour and 2SLGBTQ+ peoples are disproportionately targeted by law. They are also significantly more likely to have negative interactions with law enforcement, likely involving violence and — in the most tragic circumstances — death. These are cold, hard truths.

It is critical that any time we have discussions around law enforcement matters we must take the time to bring these perspectives into the conversation. There must be strong oversight to ensure a clear and concise anti-bias approach is considered and implemented during the use of these powers.

As we move forward, we must have a profound discussion on human rights and peaceful protests, the theft and destruction of lands, the poisoning of waters and the environment and how these peaceful protests by Indigenous peoples have been managed and contrasted in light of the three weeks of violence, destruction and damage from the recent occupations and blockades.

The blatant difference is horrifying and shocking.

Within the Emergencies Act exists the provision for the parliamentary review committee, which will examine the use of these powers after the fact. I not only believe it is critical that this committee examine the impact this invocation has had on Indigenous, Black, other people of colour and 2SLGBTQ+ peoples, but it must also examine the oversight that was provided during these times so that these acts do not occur in the first place. I know that this parliamentary review committee will have a monumental task ahead of it, but it is critical that these perspectives are not left to the side and ignored, as they so often have been. The composition of this committee must be diverse and include those who are able to bring perspectives of Indigenous peoples, persons of colour and 2SLGBTQ+ people to the deliberations.

After the Emergencies Act was enacted in 1988, it took over three decades for it to be invoked. I truly hope, as I’m sure all senators do, that it will be the last time it is ever used. Let us use this experience we are witnessing to come together to build a fairer and more just Canada for everyone. Thank you, marsee, meegwetch.

Hon. Patrick Brazeau: Honourable senators, at the age of 15 I got my first summer job. It was for the National Capital Commission. I was hired to pick up garbage with a pick and a garbage bag, and I took care of the flower beds on Parliament Hill and the surrounding areas. Every day I got to come to work that summer, I felt privileged to work on Parliament Hill because I was in awe of the structure and what went on within those walls.

It was also the summer of 1990 when we witnessed another crisis, the Oka Crisis, where we had non-Indigenous men — investors — wanting to build a golf course on a traditional Mohawk burial site. This crisis of 1990 forced the Conservative government of the day to send in the military after a request from the Quebec provincial government. I have seen and participated in many peaceful protests and have witnessed many different protests in front of Parliament Hill over the years from people across the political spectrum. However, what we have witnessed in the past weeks is anything but a protest. What seemed like a protest quickly became an occupation, which quickly became an illegal occupation.

Paralyzing the city of Ottawa and its residents is something we have not seen before — not in Canada. We saw individuals posing as Indigenous peoples, including several organizers. I do not know for a fact if these people are Indigenous or not, but what I do know is that many Indigenous peoples and organizations across the country have denounced the cultural appropriation being exercised by some of these individuals.

We saw how reporters were harassed and in some cases not able to do their jobs. We saw people chanting “fake news” toward reporters who are part and parcel of our democracy. We saw reporters being spat on. We have witnessed more interest in U.S. media, making absolute false statements about what is really happening in Canada. The amount of misinformation is pervasive because it affects us all.

Other high-profile individuals throughout the world have associated Canada’s Prime Minister to Hitler. How infantile can grown men be? This is where we are, and it’s very scary. Are we moving forward or taking a few steps back? Time will tell.

We have also witnessed the partisanship between different levels of government and the leaders of every political party throughout the country. We have witnessed jurisdictional wrangling between the federal, provincial and municipal governments and law enforcement. As an Indigenous person, I have — and I’m certain most Canadians have — witnessed the complete and differential treatment of lawful, peaceful Indigenous protests versus what we have seen this past month in Ottawa and other parts of the country. What message does this send? How do you think 1.5 million Indigenous people feel in this country after watching this unfold — after watching RCMP officers shake hands with and hug the non-Indigenous protesters?

I have never seen that happen to any Indigenous person in Canada. And it’s shameful.

There were individuals with racist behaviours, people spitting on reporters, anarchists, truckers and people who simply participated with the thought that they were taking part in history. I never thought I would see White nationalists and supremacists anywhere in the streets of Canada. I thought these were American problems.

The United States has their share of problems and seems to want to permeate our country with them. I don’t know about you, colleagues, but I have never seen so much U.S. traffic, correspondence, emails and phone messages. In fact, I’ve seen more U.S.-related correspondence in one week than I have in the last 13 years here, and I find that concerning.

Finally, we have witnessed politicians support this occupation. “Support the truckers” is what was said. We all know that they were more than truckers, more than vaccine mandates and more than people unhappy with the current government that was at play. It was an attempt to overthrow the government. It should not matter what government is in power. When there is an attempt to overthrow the government, we should join together and put democracy in action. No Liberal, Conservative, New Democratic Party, Green or independent MP should ever wish for this to occur in their country, regardless of who is in power, because Canadians choose our leaders by way of elections. We just had one four months ago. Canadians spoke.

Unfortunately, the Emergencies Act has been invoked for the first time. The House of Commons and the Senate of Canada are asked to vote on whether the invocation of the act was justified. It is difficult to know with certainty if this was necessary at this point. The fact is, no one knows exactly what happened because we do not have the facts before us. Was there foreign interference, financial or otherwise? What were the purposes of the occupation? Was there involvement by political parties? Was the Ottawa police perhaps compromised? After all, the Ottawa police chief had to step down as a consequence of the illegal occupation in Ottawa. We are not aware of the potential jurisdictional issues that may have hampered quicker action.

With all these unanswered questions, one thing is certain, however. Under the act, there will be answers to many questions Canadians have with respect to why this occupation occurred and why it lasted so long. Until then, perhaps we should all stop trying to be experts by delving into the hypotheticals of why and how this occurred.

I have faith in my country, and I have faith that we will all get the answers. Ultimately, as is always the case, it will be Canadians who will learn the facts and decide for themselves if this invocation of the act was necessary for our collective security or if it was done as a partisan abuse of power.

Until we have all the facts, I invite you to take stock of what happened and to respect another aspect of our democracy, which is due process. Rather than creating further divides, let us take a step back and let justice do its work. Under the act, if passed, an investigation or inquiry must be undertaken to seek all the facts and will have to report back to Canadians in about a year.

Colleagues, that’s why I will be supporting the act, but I wish we were not at this point. The House adopted the act by a vote of 185 in favour versus 151 against. We are not here to rubber‑stamp anything, but I will be supporting the act because by doing so, it will bring the checks and balances needed to try to get to the bottom of what occurred. Speaking for myself, justice, due process and patience will shed light on facts in a non-partisan way.

Partisanship is partisanship, but continuing to play partisan games at this time is not helpful for anyone. Let’s come together as Canadians to support and defend our democracy. Even with all its failures and inaction by the federal government, and, in particular, its treatment of Indigenous peoples throughout history, Canada is still the best country in the world.

Respect is clearly lacking in today’s politics. Perhaps social media is partly to blame, but politics are becoming very divisive and full of smears. As parliamentarians, it is our job right now to put that partisanship aside and fight against any type of hate. Canadians have every right to see us working cooperatively to get facts, not hearsay. This is not time to take cheap shots or settle political scores. This is the time for this chamber to rise above petty political tricks and consider only the needs of Canadians, without regard to political stripe.

Honourable senators, I want to remind Canadians of who we are, and of our collective values and convictions. We are a peaceful, strong, generous people. We work through our problems together, in good faith and with good will.

Life can be short, colleagues. We have one life to live. Perhaps our time would be more usefully spent trying to get along rather than in creating divide.

Those who have fuelled, supported, participated in or used this as a political tool will not be on the right side of history. Choices in life come with consequences, and freedom always comes with a price.

It is alarming but not surprising how some people support illegal occupations but quickly condemn legal, peaceful and rightful protests that have occurred in Canada. So I would like to take the time to thank all of those involved who made Ottawa boring again and who have given the citizens of Ottawa their city back. Ottawa is also my home and the home of the Algonquin nation.

In the end, I offer this to you, colleagues: The most powerful freedom fighter is democracy. Everyone has a job to do, so let’s get to work and do our part. All my relations, meegwetch.

The Hon. the Speaker pro tempore: Senator Arnot, we have three minutes left if you want to start your speech, or you can continue tomorrow morning.

Hon. David Arnot: Honourable senators, I speak to you today from Saskatoon in the heart of Treaty 6 territory and the traditional homeland of the Métis. I speak in favour of the motion. Today, I’ll speak about the rule of law, Canada’s strong democratic institutions and the role of education in maintaining and protecting our democracy.

For more than two years, Canadians have faced a public health crisis that is unprecedented in living memory. Lives have been lost, and families, jobs and futures have been altered, often with great personal, emotional and financial cost. The cost of COVID-19 to individuals and to this country is staggering. It will require analysis and inquiry.

The majority of Canadians have done their part. They have followed public health orders and understood the responsibility to keep others safe. It is important to bring some balance to this debate. I’d like to say that, as I understand it, approximately 90% of Canadian truck drivers have followed the public health orders and have understood their responsibility to keep others safe. They stood with the majority of Canadians.

Indeed, truck transport is a major component of the Canadian economy. There are approximately 225,000 truck drivers in Canada who generate $40 billion in revenue. They provide tremendous service to the people of Canada. Trucking works best when the flow of goods is predictable and consistent, and due to COVID-19, that has not been the way over the last two years. The industry has been stretched by supply chain inconsistencies, illness and burnout.

I say this to make sure that truck drivers and the trucking industry in general are recognized for the critical role they play in our country’s economy.

In the last three weeks, however, Canada has faced another extraordinary threat — in this case, a most serious challenge to the rule of law. The rule of law binds us all. It supports our rights, our freedoms and, critically, the rule of law applies to everyone, equally enforced and independently adjudicated. No person is above the law. Canadians have the right to protest, that is true —