As police continue to make arrests in attempts to end the three-week protest in Ottawa, debate has been halted on the Emergencies Act – at least for one day.
Through the Emergencies Act, new powers have been granted to freeze bank accounts of protest participants and bar people from assembling in specific places or joining protests that threaten trade, critical infrastructure, individuals or property.
The new powers took effect earlier this week, but the House of Commons and the Senate must both vote to confirm use of the emergencies law.
The House debate was to be held for five days with a vote slated for Monday night.
On Friday afternoon, the Optimist had a chance to speak with Delta Liberal MP Carla Qualtrough.
The Optimist had a detailed discussion with Qualtrough on the situation in Ottawa as well as security issues that her staff have been facing both in Ottawa and here in Delta.
Q: How will the debate continue on the Emergencies Act?
A: “Right now the plan is for debate to resume tomorrow (Saturday). From the House of Commons point of view, the Speaker of the House, on the advice of security, got all the parties together saying it would not be safe for you and your teams. There are hundreds of people in the building, even at half capacity, so to go through all the security checks with the police making arrests – it was a good call. All the parties agreed. The plan is to resume tomorrow morning, but the situation is fluid and there are of course ongoing security concerns.”
Q: How does the Emergencies Act work?
A: “It sets out a process, by definition, you are dealing with a national emergency and when this gets invoked, it immediately gives the government authority to take additional action depending on the nature of the emergency. Within seven days of doing this, you have to bring a motion and the regulations to the floor of the House of Commons for debate and then MPs and the Senate could take as long as necessary to decide whether they want to keep this in place. Then there is a vote and if it is decided to keep doing it or stop it. Right now they can take these actions. The process is that we would take four days for debate and the vote would be Monday night. Now that one of the days has been lost, I suspect the parties are in ongoing discussions to extend a day and it will be done with the agreement of all parties.”
Q: Since this decision was made to invoke the Act, have you been receiving comments from your constituents and will you be voting in favour of this?
A: “Absolutely. I think that we did have reasonable grounds to believe that the current situation constituted a national emergency. We watched what has transpired over the past few weeks, whether it is blockades disrupting lives or halting supply chains impeding trade, endangering public safety, the escalation and the kind of underlining right wing extremism, the threatening of our constitutions…when you add all of that up, we got to a point of declaring a national emergency and that’s what you can do under this act.”
Q: What is your reaction to the Canadian Civil Liberties Association announcing it was seeking a judicial review of the government's invocation of the act?
A: “I very much respect the Canadian Civil Liberties Association and the important work that they do. I’m very comfortable with the decisions that we have made. To be very clear, the Emergencies Act is subject to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The measures are targeted and temporary. There is a House of Commons joint committee between the Senate to review. There is a requirement of review after the fact. These are targeted tools to enhance what the police have already. The police have additional support if needed. This isn’t a sweeping imposition of Marshall Law, this is temporary, targeted proportionate.”
Q: How do you respond to the calls from some that the Prime Minister should have taken a different approach to this?
A: “Since the beginning, we have worked with local law enforcement agencies, with authorities at the Ambassador Bridge and in Coutts. It was only when we thought it reached this threshold in the Emergencies Act that the Prime Minister decided to invoke this law. This is not a decision we took lightly as a government or he took lightly. This was not the first thing we tried, or the second thing…it was something we are taking heavy heartedly. This is a serious thing going on in our country. The impacts on trade, people’s lives impacted in Ottawa. This is very serious and required serious action.”
Q: Has your office or staff been targeted with regards to threats?
A: “It is a real tough slog for my team right now. We are getting a lot of hateful, toxic emails. The front of my office is being targeted. It is really awful. When we talked during the election, it was targeted at me and my signs, but now it just feels like everyone has this license to be awful to my team. It just is not fair. Social media has been terrible. Death threats, vulgarity – things that you could not even imagine decent people would say even if they disagree with you.”
Q: Are constituents expressing concerns with regards to vaccine mandates?
A: “We have absolutely been hearing from constituents on all sides of this, but with 95 per cent of Deltans vaccinated, I don’t think there is a debate on vaccines in our community, but I do think there is not consensus on vaccine mandates. People are not coming and talking to me about the need to be vaccinated, but there are concerns about the need for vaccine mandates and whether or not they should be vaccinated for different purposes. It is always important for me to hear both sides of the argument, but I really ask constituents to do so in a respectful manner because we can disagree in a respectful manner.”
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