As the folk wisdom goes: Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it.
Albertans, who have a habit of complaining bitterly when they are not at the top of the national agenda, are a step closer to having their wish granted thanks to the vote of the House of Commons on Monday to authorize implementation of the Emergencies Act.
Within 60 days of the end of the current national public order emergency declared by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s cabinet on Valentine’s Day, an inquiry must be established “into the circumstances that led to the declaration being issued and the measures taken for dealing with the emergency.”
The report of the inquiry must be put before the House of Commons and the Senate 360 days after the end of the declaration of the emergency.
This is the law of the land, not subject to endless delays and procedural manoeuvres as with an inquiry conducted under provincial legislation in Alberta. It’s stated quite plainly in Part VI, Section 63, Paragraphs 1 and 2 of the Emergencies Act.
A number of prominent Albertans, quite possibly including our present premier and members of his cabinet and caucus, as well as a number of unsavoury figures connected to funding and organizing of the “Freedom Convoy” whose activities led to the national emergency, are likely to find themselves under the microscope during such an investigation.
No wonder Alberta Premier Jason Kenney would very much prefer the declaration of the national emergency to be ruled unconstitutional, because any serious inquiry into his conduct in this affair is not likely to show him in a particularly kind light.
Even if the inquiry comes too late to do him political harm, Kenney is without a doubt a man who thinks about how he will be remembered by history.
And as University of Calgary law professor Shaun Fluker wrote in the Law Faculty’s blog, part of the reason for the current lack of faith by large numbers of Canadians in our democracy is the result of actions by provincial governments like Kenney’s during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Say what you will about the far-right fanaticism of many of the leaders of the convoy insurrection, Fluker wrote that “we … find ourselves here today because of decisions made by the executive branch of governments in most provinces that have shown almost no regard for basic democratic practices.”
“Slowly but surely over the course of two years, voluntary compliance with the COVID-19 rules was going to end because the rules were (1) too often announced for the first time, and without any advance public notice, at media scrums; (2) made with little or no explanation for where the lines between acceptable and unacceptable conduct were drawn; and (3) often difficult to understand or even incoherent. And the longer this messy lawmaking went on, the uglier it would be when defiance overshadowed compliance.”
Fluker continued: “In asserting that federal emergency powers are not needed in Alberta, Premier Kenney is misconstruing the real reason for this proclamation of a national public order emergency.” (Of course, anyone who has followed Kenney’s career will not be shocked by such a turn of events.)
“The emergency is not just the blockades and occupations, which were always just a symptom of what really ails Canada as the COVID-19 pandemic nears the two-year mark,” Fluker wrote. “In my view, the real emergency is a governance and legitimacy crisis for government.
“An emergency which was created by the very sort of lawmaking practices exhibited by the Premier and his executive in addressing COVID-19, only further exacerbated the absence of any significant use of enforcement powers under the Critical Infrastructure Defence Act to clear out the Coutts blockade.”
These are important issues. Practically speaking, though, one imagines the inquiry will have to focus on the acts of the Kenney Government and the convoy conspirators leading up to the specific crisis of January and February 2022—both their omissions and commissions.
Even so, this is not likely to be an easy or happy process for Kenney and his cabinet, for the anti-vaccine mandate cabal within his caucus, or the large group of Conservative MPs, many of them from Alberta, who praised the convoy participants for defying the law and blockading trade at great economic cost and in some cases actively encouraged illegal actions.
Sadly, this may speed the decline of the Conservative Party into full-blown Republican-style abandonment of democratic principles if a result is that our parliamentary system fails to deliver electoral victories to the party in the face of its steady radicalization.
To return to the Emergencies Act, it is proof that once upon a time Canadian Conservatives could create legislation that respected democratic norms and dealt with practical matters of governance, and not the implementation of ideological nostrums in the face of common sense that dominates Conservative governments like Kenney’s.
When prime minister Brian Mulroney’s Conservative federal government penned the Emergencies Act in the 1980s, its drafters took considerable pains to ensure it met the tests of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
Unlike the War Measures Act it replaced, it requires Parliamentary oversight of the declaration of an emergency, clearly delineates the time an emergency can be in place without additional Parliamentary review, and sets out the requirement for an inquiry and the report of the inquiry to Parliament.
Last night the emergency declaration passed the first step of Parliament’s oversight, with the House voting to authorize the emergency measures by 185 to 151. The NDP supported the Liberals while the Conservatives and the Bloc Québécois voted against. The two Green MPs split their vote.
The oversight process moved to the Senate Tuesday morning.
As for the court challenge touted by Kenney on social media Saturday, it is unlikely to be anything but an embarrassing waste of time and money.
Support rabble today!
We’re so glad you stopped by! Thanks for consuming rabble content this year.
rabble.ca is 100% reader and donor funded, so as an avid reader of our content, we hope you will consider gifting rabble with a donation during our summer fundraiser today.
Whether it be a one-time donation or a small monthly contribution, your support is critical to keep rabble writers producing the work you’ve come to rely on as a part of a healthy media diet.
Become a rabble rouser — donate to rabble.ca today.
Nick Seebruch, editor
