Anti-mandate demonstrators gather as a truck convoy blocks the highway the busy U.S. border crossing in Coutts, Alta., Monday, Jan. 31, 2022.THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh
OTTAWA – Alberta received no help from Ottawa to clear protesters blockading the main border crossing with the United States until after the crisis had passed, a public inquiry investigating the federal use of the Emergencies Act heard Thursday.
And a provincial minister accused his federal counterpart of lying about the role the state of emergency played in ending the blockade in Coutts, Alta.
A convoy of 1,000 vehicles of all types drove to the small border town on Jan. 29 to protest provincial and federal COVID-19 health restrictions, blocking the highway in both directions.
The Liberal government invoked the Emergencies Act on Feb. 14, the same day RCMP in Alberta moved in to arrest protesters in Coutts. The prime minister argued the temporary and extraordinary powers were needed to end blockades in Ottawa and at border crossings.
A public inquiry, known as the Public Order Emergency Commission, is now tasked with determining whether the government was justified in triggering the legislation, which had never been used since it became law in 1988.
On Thursday text messages released by the inquiry revealed that Alberta Municipal Affairs Minister Ric McIver accused federal Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair of lying about whether the Emergencies Act was used to clear the blockade.
On Feb. 21, Blair texted McIver to tell him that the Emergencies Act was effective at addressing “the tow truck issue.”
“You were too late and did the wrong thing,” McIver responded, telling the minister that by the time the state of emergency was invoked the Coutts blockade was already over.
“Saying nothing now would be better than not telling the truth.”
Marlin Degrand, the assistant deputy minister in the Alberta solicitor general’s office, told the commission earlier Thursday that RCMP had the power to clear the convoy from the border, but it didn’t have the co-operation it needed to get the job done.
“If we were going to go and remove all of the protesters and remove the blockage, if the RCMP were to do that, that (towing capacity) would absolutely have to be in place,” Degrand said in his testimony.
Alberta looked all over the province, in British Columbia and Saskatchewan and even the United States, but tow companies refused to help. Some where sympathetic to the protest, others were paid by protesters to stay out of it, Degrand said.
The province opted against declaring a state of emergency to try and force tow operators to help, and instead asked for federal help in a formal letter on Feb. 5.
The Liberal government never formally responded to that request, but did draft a letter to turn Alberta down on Feb. 12, the commission has learned.
The undelivered letter said the province had all the legal authority it needed to deal with the protest.
Degrand said he would agree that Alberta didn’t need any more legal authority, what it lacked was the tow trucks to pull it off.
Eventually, on Feb. 12, the federal government started a working group about securing tow trucks. By that point, Alberta was already in the process of buying used tow trucks online.
Ontario’s deputy solicitor general Mario Di Tommaso is also expected to resume his testimony Thursday afternoon. His appearance was interrupted Wednesday when the lawyer examining him collapsed in the public hearing room. The lawyer is expected to make a full recovery.
During his brief appearance on Wednesday, Di Tommaso told the Public Order Emergency Commission that Ontario’s decision to declare a state of emergency proved helpful.
The commission is holding public hearings in Ottawa until Nov. 25.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 10, 2022.
