Debates of Feb. 21st, 2022

Emergencies Act

[Ziad Aboultaif, Conservative, Edmonton Manning, AB]

Mr. Speaker, this crisis started on January 7. The government knew about it for six weeks, but all of a sudden, it was an emergency.

Is the hon. member convinced that the government is not doing this for any other reason than a power grab?

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, to answer my colleague's question, for some reason, the government sat on its hands throughout the entire crisis. It did not do a single thing. It did not lift a finger.

Instead, the Prime Minister insulted the protesters and hid in his basement. At some point, he woke up. Suddenly it became urgent to bring in the Emergencies Act to resolve the situation.

It seems like he tried to save face instead of truly trying to resolve the situation.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. He raised some important points. However, does he not recognize that despite the fact that the streets of Ottawa are calmer today, some real threats remain?

There are two places near the capital where truckers are waiting. There are also truckers who have been stopped with a convoy at the Pacific Highway border crossing in British Columbia. This is not over.

Does my colleague not believe that being able to freeze bank accounts that are funding these illegal occupations is a good thing for preventing money from Donald Trump supporters and the United States from flowing in and being used to organize these sieges and protests?

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my response to the member is that when we look at Wellington Street and elsewhere around the country at this time, we can see that all is quiet.

Do we still need the police to continue their work? Yes, certainly.

Do we need to continue to be vigilant with respect to foreign influence? Yes, certainly.

However, personally, I do not feel particularly threatened at this time, and I am not convinced that ordinary folks, who are at home right now, are feeling particularly threatened.

[Alain Therrien, Bloc, La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Emergencies Act was a mistake from the get-go, and the government knows it.

Today, now that the dust has settled in Ottawa, it is even more of a mistake. Despite all that, the Prime Minister has decided to turn tonight's motion into a vote of confidence. That makes no sense. Why decide to make it a vote of confidence?

Is it to silence his own caucus, because some of its members are asking themselves serious questions, or is it to muzzle the NDP?

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very good question. With respect to the Liberal caucus, we may find out in a few years. When people write their memoirs 10, 15 or 20 years later, we often discover things.

We already know that at least three members are not very comfortable with the position of their own government. We also know that, until this morning, the NDP was not very comfortable with the government's position.

Magically, after the government decided to make this a vote of confidence, the NDP bolstered its support. It was unclear previously. I have the impression that the NDP's change in position has something to do with the threat of a vote of confidence.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will not be sharing my time because I am selfish.

How should we tackle this matter? Yesterday, I asked myself how I would start my speech, and I thought that the best way would be to examine the issue of this law's legitimacy. In my opinion, this entails establishing how a free society works. All too often, when we speak of free societies, we make the mistake of believing that a democratic society, a free society, is a society that lives consensually. That is not the case.

I recommend that everyone read Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy by Jacques Rancière, who is probably one of the foremost figures in French political philosophy. In this work, Jacques Rancière says that politics exist as soon as the “sans-part“, those who are excluded, want to have a part in society. That is what we see in class conflict, the feminist movement and the movement of homosexuals who want to be recognized. They are the “sans-part” who want to have a part in society. That is the only way the democratic process functions.

I was looking for a quote this week because the notion of freedom has been the focus of our debates. I was looking for a quote that would give a positive definition of freedom, and I thought of my loyal listener, the member for Lac-Saint-Jean, who got into a little tiff with the member for Carleton on Bill C‑8, a bill to implement certain budgetary measures.

During this exchange, the member for Carleton started preaching about freedom. Since he aspires to become the leader of the Conservative Party, his motivations might be different from others'. He finished his speech talking about the protesters and said “Freedom is on the march.” Since my colleague from Lac-Saint-Jean is a clever guy, he quickly pointed out that the member was off topic and his speech had absolutely nothing to do with Bill C‑8. The member for Carleton replied that freedom is never pertinent to the Bloc, which I thought was a little harsh.

I thought it would be appropriate to teach the member for Carleton the definition of freedom and the type of freedom he is talking about. I think this is relevant to today's debate.

I am going to share a quote from Jan Patocka, a modern Socratic philosopher. Jan Patocka died in 1977 following an intense interrogation that went wrong. He was an old man, a philosopher and spiritual advisor to Vaclav Havel, the first president of the Czech Republic.

In a book entitled Heretical Essays in the Philosophy of History, Jan Patocka wrote:

“[P]olitics is always of another order than economic management or the projection of humans in work...politics is nothing other than life for the sake of freedom, not life for the sake of survival or even for well being”.

What does Jan Patocka mean by “life for the sake of freedom”?

For me, it is quite simple, and this goes back to Rancière. Life for the sake of freedom means that people are willing to challenge the established rules in order to be recognized. Patocka even died challenging the Iron Curtain regime to see the Czech regime recognized. These are people willing to pay a very heavy price. I am not sure if my colleague from Carleton would be willing to pay such a price, but at the very least, if we now follow this line of thought, we should distinguish between two types of freedom.

There is the freedom that people seek to win, the kind that people are willing to fight for.

However, there is another very basic freedom, as Isaiah Berlin presents in Liberty. It is the best illustration possible.

In Liberty, Isaiah Berlin refers to two types of liberty: positive liberty and negative liberty. According to Isaiah Berlin, positive liberty is the freedom that allows individuals to live their lives the way they choose.

It is possible for individuals in a society to feel that they are being treated unjustly. This has happened in history, especially to women in patriarchal societies. It has happened to ethnic minorities, and it has happened to a national minority, Quebeckers. We believe that we have suffered an offence, we want to change the course of society, we engage in a struggle, and we undertake social actions in an attempt to define ourselves. This is what Isaiah Berlin called positive liberty. But Isaiah Berlin also discussed negative liberty.

Perhaps the best way to understand negative liberty is to look at a sentence by Dostoevsky in The Possessed. In this novel, Dostoevski, through the voice of Stavrogin, said, “If God does not exist, everything is permitted.” Let us leave God aside. What Dostoevsky meant is that if there are no institutions, then everything is permitted. If there is no legitimate and well-established authority, then everything is permitted.

Negative liberty therefore means that not everything is permitted. Governments are in place for that. We have principles of political associations, a Constitution that tells us that not everything is permitted. I may not do everything that I want; I may not limit the freedom of others. Therefore, this “everything” is not permitted. Ultimately, negative liberty is a bit like government action.

How are men to be made free? The one who came up with the best answer was certainly Camus. He said that it was through rebellion.

I will read a quote from Camus’s novel The Rebel. Afterwards, we will try to unpack it

What is a rebel? A man who says no, but whose refusal does not imply a renunciation. He is also a man who says yes, from the moment he makes his first gesture of rebellion. A slave who has taken orders all his life suddenly decides that he cannot obey some new command. What does he mean by saying “no”?

He means, for example, that “this has been going on too long,” [perhaps that was what we were seeing outside, but we will come back to that later] “up to this point yes, beyond it no,” “you are going too far,” or, again, “there is a limit beyond which you shall not go.” In other words, his no affirms the existence of a borderline.

Camus goes on to say:

Thus the movement of rebellion is founded simultaneously on the categorical rejection of an intrusion that is considered intolerable and on the confused conviction of an absolute right which, in the rebel's mind, is more precisely the impression that he “has the right to...” He demonstrates, with obstinacy, that there is something in him which “is worth while...”

We have heard this outside, but we will get back to it. Camus says this about someone who uses that positive power on himself and the society that revolts him.

I wonder if the protesters are rebelling in the sense understood by Camus.

I will come back to another concept we have not yet discussed, the concept of “freedumb”; the “freedumb” the protesters were demanding. That reminds me of the platonic concept of double ignorance, that is to say, a person who does not realize that he does not know things.

That goes hand in hand with the rise in far-right populist politics. In recent weeks, we heard of an American elected official who did not know the difference between the Gestapo and gazpacho. That is a good start. I hope that never happens here.

We heard people talking about alternative facts. Supposedly they exist. We heard talk of 5G, a chip being injected in people. I will not get into the issue of vaccination again, but I have even heard some questionable ideas from some members.

The most recent thing is the protester who was yelling “It's very not false”. According to him, the woman who was knocked down by a horse died, but the media was not telling people. When he was told that that had been proven to be false, he yelled, “It's very not false”. That is a new expression.

What really bothers me is that invoking a law like the one the government is proposing to use means that perhaps, one day, the government that is in power will use the somewhat controversial principles of the growing populist far right. Right now, this government could decide to do what the NDP does not want it to, namely, put a stop to the legitimate pursuit of freedom by certain movements.

Like my NDP colleagues, I see myself as a progressive. A progressive is someone who works tirelessly in an effort to support people who are seeking to free themselves from a situation they are trapped in.

In 10 or 20 years, when indigenous, environmental or anti-globalist movements try to protest to get out of a situation that seems unfair to them, perhaps someone on the other side will invoke the Emergencies Act, because once we use it the first time, it sets a precedent.

Unlike what happened 50 years ago, when the NPD leader at the time said no to the War Measures Act, my NDP colleagues will have to live with what happens in this moment in history.

[Greg Fergus, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister and to the President of the Treasury Board]

Mr. Speaker, I was very interested in my hon. colleague's comments. I found that his speech was supported by several arguments.

That said, I have a question for him about what he said at the end of his presentation.

Is that a good enough excuse to do nothing about what he too described as the far right that exists here, that has the money and the tools to do damage? In 50 years' time, we may regret it if we decided to do nothing today.

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the best tool we have against populism is education. It is not about trying to shut these people up; it is about giving them relevant and accurate information. I respectfully submit that an additional tool we could have had was the following. If our health care system was not in such bad shape, the lockdowns might have been shorter. The federal government had a role to play in this. If it had paid its fair share of funding for the health care system, perhaps the pandemic would not have stirred up this grumbling and this passion motivated by rancour in some individuals. My colleagues have a responsibility in that regard.

[Arnold Viersen, Conservative, Peace River—Westlock, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister has called Canadians names. He has called them misogynists and racists, and asked if we are actually going to tolerate these people. I am just wondering what the member's comments would be around the Prime Minister's actions in this. We saw, with the rail blockades in 2020, half of cabinet running around the country talking to everybody to try to resolve the situation when Quebec was running out of propane.

Could there not have been something similar, instead of calling Canadians names?

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in his speech earlier this week, my colleague illustrated exactly what I am criticizing. He drew a parallel with one of his friends, who was supposedly unvaccinated and could not go to restaurants. That is crass populism that must be condemned. A pandemic is a complicated situation that will not be resolved by reopening restaurants. Now, for a public policy-maker to make a speech that allows him to side with people who express their anger and hatred in an unacceptable way is something I would never go along with.

The position of the Liberal Party, which is trying to limit individual freedoms, and the position of certain members of the Conservative Party, who are trying to rally useful idiots to their cause, are both unacceptable to me.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to many of the points the member laid out. I find that we actually agree on many of these points, but one point I would like the member to elaborate more on is the connection between populism and extremism. It is true that there is an element of both of these things within this movement? We have seen it from folks such as Pat King and organizers at Canada Unity.

Would the member please elaborate on the dangers of populism and extremism?

[Mario Simard, Bloc, Jonquière, QC]

Mr. Speaker, all rebellious movements that are driven by anger and resentment are dangerous. The populism that we are seeing today is very clear for the left. It is easy to identify. We hear a lot about it, especially south of the border. I am especially worried about my colleagues in the west. Perhaps it affects us less in Quebec, but there is also left-wing populism on identity issues, where people are ready to label anyone who tries to give weight to their collective identity and who presents themselves as a Quebecker. There are now attempts to present that as spontaneously racist. That is also a type of populism that must be condemned.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the government has proclaimed a public order emergency under the Emergencies Act. The question before us today in the House is whether the proclamation is consistent with the law.

For a public order emergency to be proclaimed to deal with the blockades here in Ottawa and across the country, three criteria must be satisfied.

First, there must be an urgent, critical and temporary situation where there is serious violence or the threat of serious violence against people or property for the purpose of achieving an ideological, religious or political objective.

Arguably, the government has met this first criterion. The RCMP raid in Coutts, Alberta, resulted in the seizure of high-powered guns with scopes, handguns, ammunition, high-capacity magazines and body armour decorated with patches associated with white supremacist and other extremist groups. Thirteen people have been charged in connection with the seizure, including four with plotting to murder police officers. The RCMP says that these individuals were organized, highly armed and dangerous. In addition, some of the organizers of the blockade here in Ottawa used language that suggested they were ideologically motivated and willing to use force to achieve their ends.

The second criterion that must be met is that either the situation endangers the lives, health and safety of Canadians, and is of such proportion or nature as to exceed the capacity or authority of a province to deal with it, or the situation seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada.

The government can make the case that either or both of these elements have been satisfied. It is clear the blockades endangered the lives, health and safety of Canadians in downtown Ottawa. The diesel fumes, the constant and ear-shattering noise, the fireworks and so many other things hurt the 12,000 Canadians living around the Ottawa blockade. The Province of Ontario supported the invocation of the Emergencies Act, implying that the blockade exceeded the province's capacity to deal with the situation.

The government can also argue that the situation seriously threatened its ability to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada. The control of an international border is the hallmark of a sovereign state. At one point, four Canadian border crossings were blockaded: Windsor, Emerson, Coutts and Surrey. The blockade in downtown Ottawa, the seat of our government and our national legislature, was also arguably a threat to the sovereignty and security of Canada, as was the call by some convoy organizers for the overthrow of government.

The third criterion that must be satisfied is that the situation “cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada”. It is important to note that the act uses the word “effectively” rather than “ideally”.

The government made an announcement about the public order emergency on the afternoon of February 14, but the promulgation of the three orders in council effecting the powers took several days. The blockades ended in Windsor on February 13, in Surrey on February 14, in Coutts on February 15 and in Emerson on February 16. It is clear that the border blockades were effectively dealt with under the existing laws of Canada and not under Emergencies Act powers.

Here in Ottawa, while Emergencies Act powers were used, they were not needed. Chris Lewis said exactly that yesterday. He said that there was a lack of law enforcement and a lack of police officers, but not a lack of laws to enforce. He said that making arrests, seizing trucks, towing, cordoning off the city, putting up checkpoints and getting thousands of additional officers to assist the Ottawa police could all have been done under the existing laws of Canada. He is a former commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police: the largest police force in the province of Ontario.

Furthermore, it is clear the Emergencies Act powers allowing the government to seize financial accounts could have been done under existing law. Ontario Attorney General Doug Downey did exactly that on February 10, when he obtained an order under section 490.8 of the Criminal Code to freeze access to millions of dollars donated through the platform GiveSendGo.

Lawyer Paul Champ also did exactly that on February 17, when he obtained a Mareva injunction under existing common law that froze millions of dollars, including cryptocurrency, raised for the convoy protests.

These actions by the Ontario Attorney General and Paul Champ were done under existing laws, and were also done with court approval, unlike the Emergencies Act powers to freeze accounts without court approval that the government has now claimed for itself. These emergency powers may not pass the Oakes test with respect to proportionality or the requirement to minimally impair rights and freedoms.

The government has not met the requirement of the act that the situation cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada. Therefore, I cannot support the motion. I would add that if the House supports the motion, it would be giving the government powers it likely does not lawfully have under the act.

While I cannot support the motion, it is clear that the blockades in Ottawa and at the border were unlawful, illegal and, in many aspects, criminal. It is also clear that the existing laws of Canada did deal, and could have effectively dealt, with the situation. A lack of timeliness in law enforcement, and a lack of federal-provincial co-operation and other operational deficiencies, cannot be dealt with under the Emergencies Act, nor under the emergency doctrine of peace, order and good government.

The failure to uphold the rule of law is the issue here, not a lack of law to effectively deal with the situation. In a free and democratic society, the rule of law is essential. Without the rule of law there can be no freedom, because liberty without lawful limits, taken to its logical conclusion, is anarchy. Without the rule of law, there can be no democracy, because democracy without our most basic law, our Constitution, is nothing less than majoritarian mob rule.

It is clear we, as a country, have not been serious about the rule of law, and because we have not been serious about the rule of law, thousands of Canadians thought it appropriate to unlawfully and illegally blockade four international border crossings and our national capital for more than three weeks.

We have not been serious about the rule of law when a person’s race, religion or creed determines whether or how the law is enforced, such as when the CN mainline in Ontario and pipelines in Western Canada were blockaded for weeks on end two years ago, and when the lawlessness continued last week. We see this when a mob violently tears down statues in the public square with no consequence, when dozens of Canadian churches were vandalized or torched in the past year, and when, in this place, the Prime Minister violated the Shawcross doctrine of the Constitution by pressuring the Attorney General to drop the criminal prosecution of SNC-Lavalin, something for which he was never censured or held in contempt. We saw this last year when the government defied four orders of the House and its committee for the production of the Winnipeg lab documents.

If flagrant disregard for the rule of law is tolerated, things will fall apart. The centre cannot hold and anarchy is loosed. What is needed now is not the use of the Emergencies Act, but rather ensuring that the rule of law in this country is upheld.

[Gary Anandasangaree, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Madam Speaker, I want to ask my learned friend a very specific question with respect to the safeguards that exist within the Emergencies Act. I know it was invoked on February 14. We are debating it today. The order was presented two days after the invocation. There are other measures that are forthcoming.

Can the member speak to the safeguards that are in place to ensure that we protect the rights of all Canadians? These emergency measures are temporary, measured, and they ensure that they are in compliance with the charter.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Madam Speaker, three of the safeguards that have been put into the act are the three criteria that the government must meet in order to trigger a public order emergency.

The first is a threat or the actual use of violence to achieve a political, religious or ideological objective. The second is a threat to the health, safety and lives of Canadians that is beyond the capacity of a province to deal with, or alternatively that there is a threat to the sovereignty, territorial integrity or security of this country. The last is that there is no other law in Canada, federal or provincial, that could effectively deal with the situation.

Those three criteria are safeguards in preventing intrusions into civil liberties.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for his speech. I often enjoy listening to his speeches in the House and I respect that he presents a calm and often rational approach.

My question is simply this. When we see this discombobulation of democracy, when we hear the chief of police in Ottawa—the interim one, granted—say very clearly that they would not have been able to take action in the way they did here unless they had these resources, when we hear from the organizers their plans to continue these things—they are retreating right now, but talking about moving forward later on—and when we see this increased instability across the country, how does the member reconcile that position with what we are all seeing and experiencing across Canada?

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Madam Speaker, the issue here is not a lack of laws to effectively deal with the situation either here in Ottawa or previously at the four border crossings; it is a lack of law enforcement.

As the former commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police said yesterday, the power to make arrests, seize and tow vehicles, cordon off the city, put up checkpoints and get thousands of additional officers in to assist the Ottawa police already exists in the existing laws of Canada. In fact, he said that it is used practically every Canada Day in this city. It is used practically every Remembrance Day. Clearly the emergency powers were not required for the clearing of the blockades at the four border crossings, because in some cases they were cleared prior to the invocation of the public order emergency and in some cases before the orders had really taken effect.

[Chris Lewis, Conservative, Essex, ON]

Madam Speaker, if I were a senior member of the NDP, such as the MP for Windsor West, I would be ashamed that my leader threw the local police under the bus, as he did in the House last Thursday. I would be doubly ashamed if my leader whipped my vote on the Emergencies Act.

Once again, the NDP are poised to prop up the Prime Minister so as to not hold the Prime Minister to account. The very fact that the standoffs at the Windsor-Detroit and Coutts borders were ended peacefully, clearly demonstrates that the Emergency Act was, quite frankly, unnecessary.

I am wondering if the member would agree that the greatest emergency in Canada today is that the NDP continues to prop up this power-hungry Liberal government and today will vote with the Liberals to allow—

[The Assistant Deputy Speaker (Mrs. Alexandra Mendès), Liberal, Alexandra Mendes]

We have to allow five to 10 seconds to the hon. member for Wellington—Halton Hills to answer.

[Michael Chong, Conservative, Wellington—Halton Hills, ON]

Madam Speaker, the issue here is a failure to uphold the rule of law that has been years in the making.

Two years ago the blockades on the CN main line and in western Canada at the pipeline were allowed to continue for weeks. People who tear down statues in front of provincial Legislatures and in other public squares in this country suffer no consequences. I think we have a failure here to uphold the rule of law, and that is what is needed, rather than the invocation of the Emergencies Act.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Madam Speaker, today marks one week since the Prime Minister invoked the Emergencies Act. This has been a long, emotional and distressing week for all Canadians, no matter one's political stripe, and it is not difficult to understand why.

The Emergencies Act has never been used in Canada. It is meant to be a measure of last resort, something to sombrely consider only if all other attempts at resolution have been exhausted and only when there are no alternatives remaining. It requires the government to legally justify why it is necessary. Unfortunately, the government has failed to give the critical justification needed for this unprecedented decision.

The onus is on the government to justify every single line of the regulations it is invoking under the Emergencies Act. The Liberals need to convince Parliament why these measures are needed, rather than the opposition to explain why they are not. The onus is on the government to specifically outline how the existing laws of our provinces and nation could not deal with the protest and the onus is on the government to lay out all its evidence on how the existing Criminal Code and intelligence gathering have failed and why it needs these sweeping new powers. The onus is on the government, and Canadians are left wanting.

The Canadian Constitution Foundation said, “The high threshold for declaring a public order emergency in the Emergencies Act has not been met.”

The BC Civil Liberties Association said, “Canada has not met the legal threshold for the Act’s invocation.”

Our entire legal system is based on the notion that even in the most trying of circumstances, there is due process. To oppose the invocation of the Emergencies Act, one does not need to condone the actions of all the protesters. What we need to do is step back and review what powers we as parliamentarians are being asked to approve. In doing so, we must determine if there is legal justification. Let me remind my colleagues that political justification does not always equate to legal justification.

If we review the government's proclamation declaring a public order emergency in the Canada Gazette, we will find that almost every one of its justifications was aimed at the border closures. It is important to note that the border closures had all ended, as my colleague just said, by the time the Prime Minister spoke in this House.

There is no disagreement that blocking critical infrastructure such as railways, bridges, highways and border crossings should never be allowed. In the spirit of the agreement on that point, I hope there will be unanimous support from all parties for eternity.

The question we must ask ourselves is this: What made the government determine these specific blockades were threats to national security when previous protests were not? Was it the size and scope of their economic impact? Was there intelligence suggesting they would prolong, or were there other considerations that made these protests different from previous ones that also had shut down large parts of our economy and put communities at risk? I do not ask these questions to be rhetorical but to determine the threshold the government is using.

The government is being taken to court by constitutional and civil liberties associations for this very reason. They too are concerned about the precedent being set by invoking the Emergencies Act. They fear that sometime down the road, using the same economic or security risk justifications, some future government will do the same.

To invoke such sweeping powers, the government must be able to articulate a much stronger and definitive rationale. While this is a place normally full of platitudes, it would be wise for all of us to focus on the details of the regulations.

After careful review of the Prime Minister's speech in the House, I see that not once did he get into the details of how the specific new powers will be used, nor did he lay out any argument whatsoever on why the current laws were not sufficient. If his intent was to persuade the members of this House, he was short on details and he failed to make a convincing argument.

I have many concerns, but I first want to push back on the Prime Minister's comment that the scope of the Emergencies Act is “targeted”.

Within the regulations, the Minister of Public Safety is given an incredible amount of latitude to designate geographic areas where the Emergencies Act will be used. In fact, the regulations give the minister absolute power to decree that the act can be used for “any other place as designated”. Forgive me in advance for not being willing to support something that gives one minister such extraordinary powers.

According to the emergency preparedness minister, the government intends to continue exercising the far-reaching powers of the act for “as long as they are required”. Does that mean for the totality of the full 30 days?

If we look outside this very chamber, we will find that the trucks are gone. The obvious question is this: When can everyday Canadians return to Parliament Hill? Let me be very clear. I am not talking about on the streets or sprawled out around downtown; I am talking about on the snow-covered lawn. What information or intelligence is the government using to determine this decision? This is not a rhetorical question; it is valid and must be answered. The public cannot even come to support or oppose the very matter we are debating today. While the Prime Minister has said the government is not currently infringing on the charter rights of Canadians, such as the right to peaceful assembly on the lawn of Parliament, I beg to differ.

On the issue of the Emergencies Act prying into the personal bank accounts of people, I believe it is the most constitutionally shaky of all the government's new powers. Anyone who is downplaying the severity of the government giving financial institutions the power to freeze bank accounts has lost sight of the forest for the trees. There are reports that people who made donations before the government ever shut down the crowdfunding websites have had their bank accounts frozen. As confirmed by finance officials, the Liberal government is giving banks the absolute power to make their own decisions on whose accounts are frozen. Let me remind this House what that means: It means freezing bank accounts without a court order, without any checks and balances or any direct and immediate oversight.

I want to highlight what one law firm had to say about these regulations. Stikeman Elliott wrote:

...leaving it to financial service providers to investigate their customers or to rely on lists of names, not set out in any law, that are provided by law enforcement or other government agencies is extraordinary, particularly given the potential to be prosecuted for dealing with such persons.

I would say to my NDP colleagues that the Liberals just gave the banks the power to be both judge and jury.

Moreover, the regulations state that the banks must disclose financial information to the RCMP and CSIS if they have reason to believe an individual was involved in the protests. A “reason to believe” is a very low bar for handing over personal banking information. I fail to see how a “reason to believe” does not infringe on section 8 of the charter, which guarantees that everyone has the right to be secure against unreasonable search and seizure.

Also found within these regulations is that banks are immune from civil proceedings for compliance with this order. Regardless of ill intent or error, any individual negatively impacted has zero legal recourse.

In closing, if the government had approached this House with other options before what is in front of us today, perhaps it would have found more receptive audiences. For example, if the RCMP needed parliamentary approval to operate outside its normal jurisdiction when requested to do so by a provincial government, I see no reason why that could not be done. The Prime Minister should have accepted our leader's invitation to work with other parties to see where we could have gone from there.

I simply cannot in good conscience vote for this motion for these reasons. The powers are too sweeping, the justification is too lacking and the precedent is too dangerous. I want nothing more than for the government to show compassion and leadership for all Canadians. Moreover, I do not want to see anyone blockade or stop the movement of Canadian families or businesses as they go about their day. We must remember that we are all citizens and will remain so after this. We cannot continue to just talk past each other. Let us lower the temperature and begin the essential work of bringing Canadians back together.

[Pam Damoff, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety]

Madam Speaker, I thank the honourable member for his comments today. I have listened to some very thoughtful speeches from members of the Conservative Party during this debate. I have also listened to some that I found quite upsetting. I appreciated his comments at the end of his speech about bringing the temperature down.

One of the member's colleagues said on Twitter that passing this Emergencies Act would take this government another step towards dictatorship. I find that kind of language quite disturbing and not helpful in engaging in very civil discourse. I am wondering if the honourable member could comment on that, please.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Madam Speaker, as my colleague rightly said, in my closing remarks I said it is time to get together to come to a solution on this.

Are we going to leave the Emergencies Act in place for 30 days, when there are no trucks left on the streets of Ottawa? My colleagues have mentioned that in the House a number of times today. I believe there is as much peace on the streets as we have seen in over a month, and more so, and I believe there is an opportunity for us to get together.

We have to remember, as well, why this started in the first place. It was because the Prime Minister decided to take a sector that was already 80% vaccinated, and force a vaccination mandate. That was fine when COVID first broke out. When he saw omicron numbers already going down for two weeks before he made the decision to ask for double vaccination for these truckers, he did it to divide Canadians. There can be very few other reasons for it.

[Luc Thériault, Bloc, Montcalm, QC]

Madam Speaker, the Emergencies Act is the ultimate action a government can take. By making this evening's vote a confidence vote, is the Prime Minister not injecting partisanship into a vote that should reflect the conscience of each member of the House?