OTTAWA –
A senior official in the public safety department says the minister was “misunderstood”, saying police asked the federal government to use the Emergency Act in February.
Deputy Secretary Rob Stewart has appeared before a special joint committee to consider the Liberals’ decision to invoke the law on Tuesday night.
In April, Public Security Minister Marco Mendicino told the same commission that after weeks of blockades in central Ottawa and several border crossings, the government is in regular consultation with law enforcement, including the RCMP.
“The advice we received was to refer to the Emergency Law,” Mendicino said at the time.
But Stewart said Mendicino did not mean the police to directly ask for the law to be applied.
“I believe the intent he was trying to express was that law enforcement requested the tools contained in the Emergency Act,” Stewart said.
Deputies and senators in the committee are trying to get answers about who, if anyone, has asked the police to obtain these extraordinary powers.
RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucky and Ottawa Interim Police Chief Steve Bell said they had not asked for the Emergency Situations Act to be used.
Lucky told the committee he had discussions with the government about the potential use of the Emergency Situations Act. But she said the RCMP did not ask for the act to be referred to, but only consulted with the federal police agency.
On April 27, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the House of Commons that “the police are aware that they need tools that no federal, provincial or territorial law has.”
Francois Digel, the deputy justice minister, also appeared before the committee on Tuesday.
He said the test of whether the Emergency Law could be used was not whether existing laws – such as the Penal Code, provincial highway legislation or municipal bylaws – could be used to end a state of emergency, but “whether those laws have been used effectively. “
“Our opinion is that they were not.”
But when asked if it was a police mistake, Digel said no.
Deputy ministers said the state of emergency had allowed police to deal with the fact that there were children at the protest and that tugboat operators were reluctant to remove vehicles blocking streets in Ottawa.
Québécois MP Rheal Fortin asked Stewart if that meant another federal state of emergency would be declared if there was a similar protest in the future.
He said it would not be necessary, adding in French that “we will prevent the demonstration in the first place” and called the February protests unforeseen.
The state of emergency requires a special parliamentary committee and a federal inquiry to verify the government’s use of the law.
This report from The Canadian Press was first published on June 7, 2022.
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