Opinion: Cabinet has lots of explanations, but no answers, for why it invoked

Over the past six weeks or so, members of cabinet have offered a potpourri of reasons to explain why the federal government took the unprecedented step of invoking the Emergencies Act back in February. There have been many explanations – just no real answers.

Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino has said on multiple occasions that the decision was made on the recommendation of police. His testimony before the special joint committee struck to investigate the invocation of the act was unequivocal: “We invoked the act because it was the advice of non-partisan professional law enforcement.”

Yet law enforcement, including RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki and the interim Ottawa police chief, said they never requested the invocation of the act.

Emergency Preparedness Minister Bill Blair offered a modified explanation when it was his turn to appear before the committee. He said that though law enforcement didn’t specifically ask for the Emergencies Act, they did say they needed more tools to clear the blockades and restore order to downtown Ottawa. “We made a determination based on information that we were receiving from our officials and from local law enforcement about the challenges they were facing,” he said, pointing to the difficulty that some jurisdictions were having in securing tow trucks as one example.

Yet Mr. Blair also acknowledged that the protest at the Coutts border crossing in Alberta was cleared by the RCMP before the Emergencies Act was invoked, suggesting police were quite capable of dispersing protesters without extraordinary powers. Mr. Blair nevertheless insisted that the wider threat posed by other demonstrations meant police needed to be given additional tools.

When it was her turn to appear before committee, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said the justification for invoking the act was economic. “I was very gravely concerned about the damage to our trading relationship with the United States and our reputation as a reliable partner,” she said.

But when asked by the NDP’s Matthew Green to provide specific evidence that the economic fallout would be so severe as to meet the threshold of a threat to the security of Canada as defined by Section 2 of the CSIS Act, Ms. Freeland dodged the question. “Let me again be really, really clear,” she said, before listing off vague observations about what the disruptions meant for business and trade.

Was the Emergencies Act justified? Without knowing what cabinet knew, it may be impossible to say

If Marco Mendicino misled Parliament, he has to go

These committee hearings have so far revealed, therefore, that the Emergencies Act was invoked because it was specifically asked for by law enforcement (but also never requested by law enforcement); because police asked for additional tools (which were not needed to clear the Coutts and Windsor, Ont., blockades); because the protests were affecting our trade relationship with the U.S. (you’ll have to just take Ms. Freeland’s word on this one); and also because, as Ms. Freeland implied back when the act was first invoked, there was concern about terrorism and money laundering (though FINTRAC deputy…