Declaration of Emergency Committee on June 7th, 2022

[Rob Stewart]

I'm talking about Canadian tow trucks and over 2,000 police officers.

[Claude Carignan]

But that's not a problem. You don't need the Emergencies Act to get more police.

Do you remember how many police you had at the Summit of the Americas? There were a lot more.

[Rob Stewart]

Here, the issue was assembling the police resources to execute the plan that had been made by Ottawa police. It called for moving a number of members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to Ottawa. It had to be done fairly quickly, and that is almost always a problem...

[Claude Carignan]

Right, but the Emergencies Act didn't offer anything extra...

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

Thank you.

[Claude Carignan]

Mr. Fortin was gentle with you.

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

It's not a different set of five minutes, unfortunately.

We will now move on to Senator Harder.

Senator Harder, you have five minutes, sir, and the floor is yours.

[Peter Harder]

Thanks very much, Chair.

Deputy Minister Stewart and officials, welcome. We appreciate your testimony here tonight.

I want to go back to some of the questioning that Mr. Green initiated with respect to your perspective on the events leading up to the invocation of the emergency measures.

Earlier tonight we heard your colleague Deputy Daigle say that the events exceeded the capacity of the jurisdictions in play at the time. That's referred to in section 58 of the measure itself.

When did you come to the view with your colleagues that this was in a sense a collective judgment as to where things were going in this, what you describe as, unprecedented and unpredictable set of circumstances?

[Rob Stewart]

When did we come to that view?

[Peter Harder]

Was it Valentine's Day or some time in advance of that?

[Rob Stewart]

It was in advance of Valentine's Day.

In the course of our consultations with federal and provincial colleagues and police of jurisdiction, it came to our attention that, in some circumstances, there were a lot of challenges in terms of enforcing the law. That related to the number of people who were available to do so and, therefore, their ability to apply the laws and the bylaws.

What we also became conscious of, and I've mentioned this before, is the evolving nature of the protest, including the potential for further blockades. It was in part, as I've suggested, the aim of the act to deter those from occurring.

[Peter Harder]

We'll get to the invocation itself, but in the preceding days, as the city invoked their emergency measures in Ontario, were you in your conversations with your counterparts urging the invocation of those emergency measures?

[Rob Stewart]

Yes.

[Peter Harder]

If I could ask in a more provocative fashion, why did it take so long for you to invoke the emergency measures at the national level? It was clear for those of us observing this on a day-to-day basis, including yourself.... It was almost two weeks of observed circumstance where the capacity of the police to maintain order and reduce the occupation was exceeded.

[Rob Stewart]

I'm tempted to say that I think we'd be under more aggressive questioning if we'd invoked it any earlier than we did, but the fact is that it took time to come to a full assessment of the situation.

[Peter Harder]

Okay, and as you worked through from February 14 to 23 in the daily—and I'm sure many times a day—assessment of how things were going, did anything provoke you to conclude that the emergency measures were not working as you had expected? Were there surprises in the operationalizing of the emergency measures themselves?

[Rob Stewart]

There were certainly some challenges along the lines of implementation of the economic measures, where there was a lot of misunderstanding as to what they were intended to do and how they would operate. That was unexpected. Otherwise, I think it was the opposite. We were fortuitous in having some of the blockades at the border resolved at a similar time. As it evolved, the situation was calmed quite quickly.

[Peter Harder]

Yes, I would share that observation.

My sense is that, until the invocation of the emergency measures at the federal level, the police actions were—I would use the phrase—a failure, and I was impressed by how quickly, once the invocation took place, the police actions were a textbook case in how to deal with a large-scale occupation.

I'm perplexed by the night-and-day difference between the operation as we saw it unfold here in Ottawa, at least.

[Rob Stewart]

I would suggest that it was in fact surprisingly non-violent when we had fears that it could become violent. I would attribute some of that to the fact that the act was deterring people from joining the protest.

[Peter Harder]

As you worked through those days, you were not certain when the revocation would take place. Was the revocation effective as soon as the professionals managing the operation felt it could be revoked, or were you pressured at all to revoke early?

[Rob Stewart]

I can't speak to the decision itself, but I can tell you that the advice was that the act was no longer needed.

[Peter Harder]

Was the decision taken right after that advice was given?

[Rob Stewart]

Shortly thereafter.

[The Joint Chair, NDP, Matthew Green]

Thank you. You squeezed a couple...but you also concede time on a frequent basis.

We will now go online to Senator Campbell.

Senator Campbell, sir, you have five minutes.

[Larry W. Campbell]

Thank you, Chair. I want to thank the witness for coming today.

I want to go back to the inability leading to a failure on the part of the police. If I can ask, how long have you been in your position and working for Justice?