So many emergency powers, so few police willing to use them.
That’s the rub as Canada moves into uncharted territory with the federal Emergencies Act being invoked alongside provincial orders and court injunctions aimed at pushing the Freedom Convoy out of Ottawa’s core and away from border crossings.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has an odd sense of timing for his heavy-handed stand against what was a “fringe” movement just 18 days ago.
His unprecedented leap into legislation of last resort was announced just as trucks started rolling out of residential streets in Ottawa or crossed the unblocked Ambassador Bridge into Detroit while RCMP diffused armed protesters in Coutts to the soundtrack of provinces rolling back vaccine restrictions.
Besides, if this was such a vital and magnanimous offer of emergency federal assistance, it’s strange how only two premiers gave it their enthusiastic support.
But the big question is whether new political powers will actually trigger police action because, as we’ve seexjmtzywn with disquieting frequency, political resolve is not the same as a police resolution to these occupations and blockades.
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Sending in more RCMP won’t end the Ottawa paralysis if they merely join invisible or stand-around local forces in doing nothing to squeeze out the protest.
Even doing what protesters demand doesn’t seem to soften their intransigence. Their determination to party on appears to harden with every restriction repealed by the provinces.
But still, it’s something from Trudeau after three weeks of phone calls, committees and say-nothing news conferences by many furrow-browed ministers.
And there was a welcome sleeper in the announcement as the government moved to track and block the flow of crowd-funding to convoy leaders and crack down truckers using their vehicles for the protests.
Starving the ringleaders of funds, suspending their insurance and hitting drivers in their big-rig paycheques will do more to end this showdown than bylaw-breaking tickets and handcuffs.
But these moves aren’t just about boosting police numbers, thinning trucker wallets and ordering reluctant tow trucks to perform haul-away service on the brotherhood. Most of these moves could be done under provincial emergency orders.
It’s another emergency that’s demanding all-in action by Trudeau – salvaging his leadership.
Faced with plunging approval numbers and internal pushback to his leadership style and substance, Trudeau needs a fast and big win over the protests or his leadership is cooked.
The Emergencies Act will probably help polish his tarnished image, but only if the blockades come down and Ottawa’s core clears out soon without the sort of violence and bloodshed that puts Canada at the top of global newscasts.
Even then, there’s lingering fury in the land aimed at Trudeau for giving this mess the traction it needed to become a convoy by imposing a medically-unnecessary vaccine requirement for crossing borders on the economy’s most solitary occupation.
So it’s still very possible, if not probable, Trudeau will face an ongoing state of personal emergency from this fringe festival.
He’s not alone in being collateral damage though.
Convoy-cuddling Pierre Poilievre’s prime ministerial ambitions, if he wins the Conservative leadership, are now about as likely to be realized as the renewal of the Ottawa police chief’s contract.
And Ontario Premier Doug Ford could have a much harder time winning re-election in the spring after his action-adverse behavior early in the protest.
But Justin Trudeau will suffer the most because responsibility rises to the top and the prime minister has done nothing to accept or even acknowledge his key role in creating this mess.
And as his just-watch-me moment, invoking the Emergencies Act was late out of the gate and mostly mimics powers which already exist in provincial orders or court injunctions.
This leaves Justin Trudeau’s reign as prime minister facing its own mandate restriction – specifically this being his last term as Liberal leader.
Whipping out the Emergencies Act was a desperate attempt to vaccinate his Liberal leadership from the rebellion even as internal caucus concerns about his performance went public.
So will the fringe fallout send a besieged and belittled leader walking in the snow toward retirement?
Well, I guess there’s only one answer for that: Just watch him.
That’s the bottom line…
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Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, Justice Minister and Attorney General of Canada David Lametti and President of the Queen’s Privy Council for Canada and Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair stand behind Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announces the Emergencies Act will be invoked to deal with protests, Monday, February 14, 2022 in Ottawa. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
