Failure of intelligence led to failure in policing during Freedom Convoy: 'levels of law enforcement must act sooner,' say insiders and experts, by mike_lpnt cdnpoli (subs)
Perrin Beatty, architect of Emergencies Act not yet convinced feds were right to invoke it over Freedom Convoy
“This was an absolute abject failure of policing—we can manage Canada Day, we can manage Remembrance Day, and yet with all of these signals, they were not adequately prepared or they had zero plan for being able to do this,” said Smith. “The government of Canada did its level best to follow all the rules and procedures that it had available to it […] and the Emergencies Act was justified,” said Smith.
“This convoy came rolling in to Ottawa, we watched them, so I don’t know why they were so surprised,” said Smith. “Levels of law enforcement must act sooner—there was too much tiptoeing around, in my view.”Cam Holmstrom, who worked as an NDP staffer under former leaders Jack Layton and Thomas Mulcair, and is now the founder and principal at Niipaawi Strategies, said what stood out “was just the mass confusion and disorganization among police forces off the hop.
Holmstrom said that he didn’t think that there is going to be a political downside for the government for the action it took, as most of the people who support them already back them or support another progressive party.“What [Justin Trudeau] does, what he says, when he says it, they’re going to be angered, they’re going to be outraged, and they’re going to be fuelled from it,” said Holmstrom.
Justice Paul Rouleau leads the Public Emergency Order Commission at Library and Archives Canada in Ottawa.“Most people’s views on the use of the Act seem to be dependent on whether or not they’re sympathetic to the convoy, and that’s really unfortunate, because if you view it through the lens of not conceding something that’s maybe wrong because it hurts the people I support, whether that’s government or the convoy, we get into a really dangerous place.
“Someone needs to explain where that interpretation comes from, because if not, this whole thing has basically been for nothing, because rather than focusing on the legal standard that’s in the law, we’ve basically presented with a different legal standard,” said Wudrick. In the final week of hearings that began on Oct. 13, a number of high-profile cabinet ministers testified at length in front of the committee, including Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino , Justice Minister David Lametti , and Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland .
“Instead of decreasing the amount of concern, the occupation at Coutts seemed to be emboldened, and say ‘look, it’s starting to work, let’s keep going,’ instead of actually de-escalating,” he said. “We have experts, we have people inside the organizations that, you know, really well understand those dynamics. And in this context was to make sure that the government—within the confines of the invocation of the Emergencies Act—but also more broadly about what is happening in the country and how the dynamic could change,” said Vigneault.
But Mendicino also said it was his responsibility as minister of public safety “to be accountable to Canadians when it comes to equipping police with the tools and the resources that they need to restore public safety,” said Mendicino. “We had to look for ways to resolve this, but not physically hurting anyone, especially not a child,” said Freeland. “That was a consideration that very much shaped the development and use of the financial measures.”
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