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Feb/20/22 9:03:16 a.m.
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Mr. Speaker, my heart aches to be in the House speaking on this today, and I want to echo some words from my constituents. I know many of us in this room have had thousands of emails and phone calls from constituents. Here are just a couple of quotes from some of those emails and phone calls: “Never did I think I would see this in my country” and “I do not recognize our Canada right now. Our anthem has lost all meaning this week.” Let us remember our anthem: “True patriot love in all of us command” and “The True North strong and free!” That is what our anthem stands for, and when Canadians and my constituents are telling me they think our anthem has lost all meaning because of the actions over the last several weeks, it is disheartening. They are sending these emails because there is a crisis in this country. However, the crisis is not what the Prime Minister is depicting. The crisis is a lack of trust from Canadians in the Liberal government and the Prime Minister. That is the crisis we are facing. When citizens come to Ottawa, the seat of our national government, what they expect is to be heard and respected. Instead, the Prime Minister vilified, mocked and stigmatized. Let us take a look at what the Prime Minister preaches and what he practises. He preaches that diversity is our strength, that a Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian and that he has their backs. However, what the Prime Minister practises is calling them racist, misogynist, the fringe and unacceptable. These are not the actions of a leader. These are the actions of a schoolyard bully, and that is exactly how the Prime Minister has acted. The Prime Minister said invoking the Emergencies Act was the last possible step he would take. It was not the first, it was not the second and it was not the third. What were steps one, two and three? None of us have seen them. It clearly states in the Emergencies Act that to invoke the legislation we must table a document that outlines who we have spoken with, such as groups, organizations and people, before we press the nuclear option. Did he speak to anyone? Did he go outside and meet with the protesters? No. Did he speak with anyone outside his bubble before he pressed this nuclear option? No. What the Prime Minister did was hide in his cottage. When Canadians wanted hope and needed leadership, he abandoned them and neglected his duty. The Prime Minister led us into this crisis. He had no intentions of ending the mandates. He wanted no path forward for a united Canada. Instead, every time, he doubled down. He threatened to increase restrictions and vilified millions of Canadians, further stoking fear and division. The Prime Minister's mission is accomplished. Here we are, as a country, divided and fallen. This was not a national emergency. This was not a security issue. This was a political emergency brought on by the Prime Minister. It was a political emergency because over the last few weeks Canadians found their voice. They found their voice to stand up for what they believe in. They found their voice to push back against a bully. The vaccinated and unvaccinated found their voice to say they want their jobs back, they want their families back and they want their lives back, and when the Prime Minister saw Canadians standing up, he pressed the panic button. That panic button was the Emergencies Act. Here, I want to be very clear. The ramifications of invoking the Emergencies Act are profound. That is because it has never been done before. During 9/11, the Oka crisis and the height of this pandemic, no government ever talked about invoking the Emergencies Act. Two years ago, when antienergy activists blocked highways, railways and ports, the government under the Prime Minister never talked about the Emergencies Act. Those protests lasted for 17 days and actually brought our entire economy to its knees, as zero trade was happening. Did they think about the Emergencies Act then? No. Meanwhile, over the last week, the blockades the Prime Minister is saying are devastating our economy in Coutts, at the Ambassador Bridge and Emerson have all been resolved and it did not take the Emergencies Act to do it. They were resolved because the police services in those areas used the tools that were available to them under the Criminal Code, existing tools. There was no need for the Emergencies Act to resolve these blockades. In many cases, people just went there and listened. Did the Prime Minister do that? He has refused to do that. Several of my colleagues and I went to Coutts and spent hours talking with the organizers. They said they just wanted to be heard. That is what they were asking for. They felt they were heard because we went there. We reached out to them and had a conversation and they made the decision to start pulling out. These are families from across Alberta, in my case from Coutts, that are frustrated and angry because no one was listening to them. What happened when they pulled out of the blockade? We can see it on video on YouTube. They stood hand in hand with police officers and sang O Canada, and in many cases hugged one another and shook hands. That is what happens when we do not use a sledgehammer. What is the threat to national security? These blockades have been removed. What is the justification for invoking the Emergencies Act? The simple answer is that there is none. A prominent lawyer in my riding sent me a note that said, “There was never a point with regard to any alleged blockade that could not have been resolved under the existing Canadian law that would justify the invocation of the Emergencies Act.” Yesterday, in a scathing editorial, The Wall Street Journal stated, “In abusing these powers for a nonemergency, [the Prime Minister] crossed a democratic line.” I would argue the Prime Minister wants to erase that line entirely. The Liberal finance minister has already said that she wants to make some of the powers that have been invoked as part of Emergencies Act permanent. Was the endgame of invoking the Emergencies Act, which we all now know was unwarranted and unjustified, to simply make portions of this power grab permanent? Was that the Liberals' goal all along? Will the Liberals ban protests that do not align with their ideology? Will they retain access over Canadians' savings accounts? They are saying these powers are geographically targeted. We know that is not true. The financial implications of freezing bank accounts impact every single Canadian. It is not geographically targeted. I have no words for this type of audacity and unfortunately this is real. This is happening in Canada, not Moscow, not North Korea and not Cuba. It is right here. I received a call at my office from a single mother in my riding. She donated $20 to the convoy because she felt it was important. She wanted an end to the mandates. She donated $20. Since the Liberals have invoked the Emergencies Act, they have threatened to freeze the accounts of anybody who supported this convoy or the protests. When the Minister of Justice was asked what metrics there would be to decide whose accounts would be frozen, he could not answer or would not answer. Instead, he compared anyone who supported these protests to terrorists. Is this mom a terrorist? Is she a racist? No, this mom is terrified. She is terrified her accounts will be frozen and she will be unable to feed her kids or will maybe miss a mortgage payment and lose her home. This is who this mom is. Of course she is not a terrorist, but this is the fearmongering we see and the threats that are happening. This is a sad day in our country. It is incumbent on all of us in the House to defend civil liberties when a governing party so callously and blatantly wants to travel over them. I look at the bricks in this House that were built on a strong foundation of democracy, freedom and a strong, united country. The government is taking a sledgehammer to those foundational bricks of our democracy. We cannot and we must not let that happen.

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