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Nov. 9, 2022 - Viva & Barnes
07:45:38
Emergencies Act Inquiry - Justin Trudeau Bad Man - Nov. 9, 2022
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Time Text
Order a lot.
The Public Order Emergency Commission is now in session.
La Commission sur l 'état d 'urgence est maintenant ouverte.
Good morning.
Bonjour.
Okay, so we have a new witness, I expect, this morning who's on for the commission.
Okay.
Good morning, Mr. Commissioner.
Jean-Simon Schoenholtz, Commission Council.
Our witness this morning will be Mr. Jim Willett.
Good morning, Mayor.
Mr. Mayor Willett, will you swear on a religious document or do you wish to affirm?
I swear on the Bible.
For the record, Please state your full name and spell it out.
My full name is Jimmy Willett, J-I-M-M-Y, W-I-L-L-E-T-T.
Do you swear that the evidence to be given by you to this commission shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
I do so swear.
Thank you.
Good morning, Mayor Willett.
Good morning.
So I understand that you're the mayor of Coutts, Alberta.
That's correct.
And you've been a resident of Coutts since 2013?
That's correct.
And a councillor for the past five years?
Yes.
And mayor for four years now?
Yes.
Okay.
And you had an interview with me and my colleagues on September 6th of this year.
Do you remember that?
Yes, I do.
And you remember seeing a summary of your interview?
I do.
So if we could just pull up WTS6012.
So this is going to be a summary of that interview.
You had an opportunity to review this summary, correct?
I did, yes.
Okay.
And I understand that you have a clarification to your summary this morning.
I do.
When we talk about the police presence in the village, I mentioned the fact that there were around six police cars I saw the first day.
And then the next mention I made of police was when the...
When the group moved in on the 1st or 2nd of February, actually there was a police presence growing all the time in the village.
It didn't go from 6 to 50 in one day, three days into the protest.
Yes.
So I'll bring you to that passage just so we can confirm.
So on the second page, and it's the fourth paragraph down, So this is where you say the paragraph starting on January 29th.
Second to last sentence, he observed approximately six RCMP vehicles at the border that day.
Then you say on February 1st, an additional 42 RCMP vehicles arrived at the border.
And what you're saying is that between those dates, there was a gradual buildup.
There was a buildup, yes.
Perfect.
Thank you.
So we're going to put that summary into evidence.
Now, I understand, Mr. Mayor, that you live about four blocks from the border and three blocks from where the protest was occurring.
Is that about right?
Yeah, that's correct.
And while these events were happening, would it be fair to say that you attended the location or went to look what was going on on a fairly regular basis?
That's correct, yes.
And what's the population of the village of Coutts?
Last census had us at 224.
And I understand that the village's amenities include a convenience store, a restaurant, a bank, but that a number of the other services that residents would use would be found in Milk River, is that correct?
That's correct.
All of the major things that you take for granted in a larger community, we have to go to Milk River for doctor, pharmacy, dentist, hardware store, any of that kind of thing, grocery store.
And Milk River is about 18 kilometers away?
18K.
That's good.
So if we could just pull up COM924.
This is a map of Coutts and the surrounding area.
We looked at a similar map yesterday with one of the other witnesses, and so I won't go into detail on this, but if we can just go to page five.
And if we could...
Yeah, that works.
So...
My understanding is that the blockade formed around the point identified as checkpoint four.
That's correct.
That's correct.
And Smuggler Saloon, which we'll talk about a little bit today, that is a local establishment, and that's identified here on the map as well.
Yes.
And that's where a number of protesters regularly met.
Yes, that became a gathering spot.
And so my understanding is that the blockade that occurred was on Highway 4. Is that correct?
Yes.
And that highway connects Coutts and Milk River?
That's our connection, yeah.
When, and I know things may have fluctuated during this period, but when the blockade was blocking both lanes of traffic, was it preventing Coutts residents from traveling to Milk River?
Yes, it was.
And would it have also been preventing traffic flow from the border?
Coming out from the border?
Yes, yes.
And any traffic south to the border?
Yes.
Okay.
Now, I also understand that there was some kind of route, and I'm hoping you can explain this to us, some kind of alternative route available through what I think you referred to as Patty Jo's field or something like that.
It was actually her yard.
I wasn't there when all of this part of the world was developed.
But when the highway was turned into a four-lane major thoroughfare, things changed.
An access road runs along to the south of that highway and ends at a farm there.
Local family rented the farm.
Then they continued their road around their house, and it connected to the street at, I forget what that is, 4th Street, I think, in Coutts.
And with permission, ordinarily, you'd let Patty Jo know that you wanted to take a load or whatever that way to miss the scales.
Can I say that?
That you were going to be going through her yard, and you'd drive through their yard, and that was an alternate route, as it were.
It suddenly began carrying a whole lot of traffic, and they got to the point where they couldn't use their home, really.
And so how was that route being used during January and February of this year, When there was a full blockade on the highway, what did it allow traffic to do?
Well, it allowed you to miss the blockade, and you could go up close to the rail crossing.
There's a county road there, and it goes out onto the highway just at the rail crossing around the curve from what we're looking at here.
And so it allowed people to drive through there, miss the blockade, and go on up.
And so would it allow traffic coming from the border to circumvent the blockade and go all the way up to Milk River?
It would have, except it's not really a truck route.
And if somebody came in driving, there's no reason that they couldn't have cut through Coots and then through Patty Jo's place.
But you'd have to know.
if you're local, you know.
And, yeah.
Yeah, you could get around.
And I assume the same is true for any Coutts residents trying to get to Milk River.
They could have also used that route had they known.
Yeah, everybody knew it was there and you could go that way.
And are you aware of whether RCMP was redirecting any traffic through that route?
Yes, they did.
We talked, I talked with Curtis, Corporal Curtis Peters, who was my contact, and let him know about the road.
He wanted to, they made some communication, and what we wound up doing, what they wound up doing was making a square.
The ground was frozen, and so they were able to run straight ahead from the...
The street make a right at the end of Patty Jo's property and go down that way so you didn't have to go through her yard.
And so it became an unofficial exit point.
In fact, they took trucks through there later.
Okay.
Thank you very much.
I understand that police services for the village are provided by the Provincial Division of the RCMP?
That's correct.
And the nearest detachment is in Milk River, correct?
And how many officers are posted there?
Four to five.
I'd like to go to COU 50249.
I understand that on January 4th, a protest organizer attended the village office.
To advise of the upcoming protest, do you remember that?
Yes, you'll see this is St. Kelly.
She's the assistant in the office to my CAO, and she received a phone call.
And during that phone call, how did the protester describe the anticipated protest?
They were just giving us a heads up that they were going to be coming and...
Doing a slow roll around the entrance to the country.
And as you can see, it says that they won't be blocking any residents from using the entrance and exit.
If we can go to COU, 40 is 1515.
So I understand from your witness statement that on social media a little bit later, around the 27th, I think you said, you saw a post suggesting there would be an attempt to block the border.
Yes.
Is this the post that you saw?
Yes, it is.
Okay.
And do you know where you saw this posting?
It was on a...
Bulletin board out of Lethbridge.
My wife spotted a link on the Lethbridge area.
How are the roads?
It's a Facebook post that obviously gives traffic reports and there was a link there and we followed that link to this particular document.
And so, were you concerned at that time about the risk of a blockade occurring?
Very much so.
And why were you concerned?
In particular for your residents, can you tell us about why you were concerned?
We had been slammed by snowbirds, which, if you don't live there, that may make no sense at all.
The 18th of November, the U.S. changed the border crossings to allow fully vaccinated people to enter the states.
And all of the people who ordinarily go south for the winter down to Arizona in their RVs and so on decided they had to be there at midnight in order to be the first to cross the border.
And we wound up with the largest demonstration anybody down there had seen.
Yet of truck blockages and so on.
We had a highway blockage that ran across the tracks and on off over the hill.
And they came into the town and double parked everywhere, blocked both entrances to the village so that in the event that we needed to get our fire truck out or something, we wouldn't have been able to do it.
So we had experience with the blockage.
And I had visions of what was going to happen here as well.
And my understanding is that wasn't a protest.
That was just a number of people trying to cross the border at the same time.
I did a lot of protesting, but no, it wasn't a protest.
Thank you.
I understand.
So if we can just...
Pull up for reference COU 183.
I understand that on that same day, January 27th, you wrote to the Premier, Premier Kenney of Alberta, and the Solicitor General, Sonia Savage, to advise them that you had heard about this risk of a blockade, correct?
That's correct.
And I understand someone called you.
The next day in response to this email?
Yes, I received a call from the Solicitor General's office.
I do not know the name of the person.
I remembered the name Pilgrim, and nobody but that name has ever worked for the government of Alberta that I can find, so I'm not sure who I spoke to.
Anyway, saying to the effect that I had woken everybody up around there, that they...
They've been in contact then with the police of all flavors and they were going to RCMPs on top of it and we've got it under control basically.
That's what I remember.
So my understanding is that you observed on January 29th the convoy driving up to Yeah, me and everybody in town, I think, were out to see what was going on.
And can you maybe just tell us what you observed on that day?
Well, about what I expected.
I'd seen convoy demonstrations by other groups on television and online.
A lot of trucks, a lot of signs, a lot of honking.
It was a convoy, a parade of vehicles from half tons to no monster trucks, but large tractor trailers.
And that pinpoint, that checkpoint four that we looked at before on the map.
That's where you saw them begin to U-turn, to head back towards Milk River?
Yeah, that's Highway 500, and it's a major crossing point that comes up from over the tracks out to the east of the village and then makes a crossing there with Highway 4. So it's the first place that you could really make a U-turn.
Or the last place, I guess, if you're coming from the north, it's the last place you could make a U-turn, either there or our next exit, and it was smaller.
So the RCMP, I think, had decided this was the best place to turn everybody around.
And my understanding from your witness statement is that about 45 minutes later, you observed that they had blocked that intersection where they were...
Where they were U-turning, is that correct?
Yeah, I think the RCMP told me 42 minutes, but it happened, yeah.
And how many RCMP vehicles did you observe that day?
Again, there's a lot going on, so I didn't sit there and count, but I saw half a dozen vehicles.
They escorted the...
Convoy down and made sure that they made that U-turn.
And that's what happened.
The vehicles started turning and going back up the road.
So I saw maybe six, ten at the most RCMP vehicles.
And did you ever hear about anything about it being a splinter group or something like that that had caused the blockade?
A splinter group from the group that had organized the convoy.
I knew from what I was reading, again, I spend way too much time online, but I knew from what I was reading on social media that there were other groups coming and joining up.
At that time, I...
I naively believe that it was all about the mandates that had been...
Well, the removal of the...
Forgive me, I do this once in a while.
I thought that it had to do with cross-border truckers.
Having their permissions removed.
For two years, they've been traveling back and forth, exempt from vaccination requirements and so on.
And just when things were starting to loosen up, I mentioned the 18th people are starting to go across and everybody's getting more normal feel.
Suddenly, the federal governments in both Canada and the U.S. decided that you no longer have an exemption, you're going to have to be vaccinated.
And I think that was the tipping point.
So I thought everybody was coming for that purpose.
Okay.
Long question.
Long answer.
That's okay.
You told us in your interview that the RCMP appeared to be caught off guard.
By the blockade, how did you come to that conclusion?
Well, at that 42-minute mark when the trucks drove into the median and across...
Both lanes of traffic going both directions, it became obvious that nobody was in control.
Nothing happened other than flashing lights and talking to the guys, and it came to a standstill, and that was it.
Mr. Van Hugenbos yesterday told us that on January 31st, the...
Protesters let some commercial vehicles through, commercial vehicles that had been waiting at the blockade since the time it had become blockaded.
Are you aware of that, of commercial vehicles being let through on the 31st?
Yes.
I have a vantage point in my house where I can see what's going on on the highway.
We had been worried about these people sitting there, their loads, their refrigerated trucks, and observed them going along talking to them and some of the vehicles being let to leave.
Thank you.
I understand that you had regular communications by phone and text with Minister Sani, the former Minister of Transport for the province, correct?
That's correct.
So we'll pull up your text messages with her and go through some of those.
That's COU6016.
Start on the second page, I believe.
So in here, this is February 2nd at 1241 p.m.
Minister Sani says, I'm sorry this is happening.
Please take care.
I'm working on this nonstop.
What did you understand?
What do you want her and the Alberta government to be doing at this time to respond to the protests at this early stage?
Well, I understood her position, not just from text so much.
We had phone calls as well.
She was working both sides, trying to talk to the people who'd organized the protest.
And also with the provincial administration to get some kind of action happening.
She's responsible for or was responsible at this time for seeing that that traffic flow works.
That's our lifeline in Alberta.
And so she's...
Pulling out all stops, talking to anybody she can.
I know she talked to truckers.
She talked to Marco, to...
I have trouble with his last name, but he'll forgive me.
Anyway, with the contact people for the convoy, anybody that she can talk to.
So I, knowing the minister...
The way I do and the dedication that she shows for her position means just what it says.
She's working on it non-stop.
So your understanding is that she was trying to negotiate some kind of resolution?
Yes.
If we can go a bit lower.
Okay.
So here we see at 616 on February 3rd, you asked Minister Sani whether she was willing to come to Coutts to meet the protesters.
Do you recall that?
Yes.
And the response is, of course, I just have to get clearance from the bus and the RCMP.
Did she ever come to meet the protesters?
No, she did not.
She got as far as Lethbridge.
Didn't get permission to come farther south.
And you understood that to be permission from who?
The provincial government.
Okay.
Did you ever receive an explanation for why that permission wasn't granted?
Not, no.
And why did you believe that it would be helpful for her to come to Coots?
We thought at the very first that it would be convenient because, as I said, she's responsible for transportation, and this is a transportation-related blockade.
She thought that possibly she could come and talk to people and explain to them that the importance of having that corridor continue and stop all the madness.
Everybody was caught flat-footed and we're trying everything we could to get it going.
So she was willing to come down and talk to whoever to make things happen, to get it opened up.
Thank you.
If we can go down a little bit.
To the next page.
A little bit lower.
Okay.
At 721 on February 3rd, you say the second line, they've closed the highway down again.
It was open briefly.
A few commercial vehicles did go through.
Then someone barricaded the highway again.
So can you maybe give us a sense of...
How often...
It seems to me that the highway was reopening at times.
We see later in your text messages that some traffic was trickling through.
How often was the highway completely blockaded?
You would have had to stand there and watch to be able to tell.
It would be open.
We'd see a truck or two or three go through.
And then the next thing you know, well, it's closed again.
And the whole idea, I think, that at this point that they were trying to do was to open up a single lane each way and keep traffic flowing.
But it was...
Well, you saw my mention here earlier, they're trying to find a leader.
At that time, there were several different groups.
It was mob rule, I guess.
I don't like that expression, but that's the idea.
There was nobody really able to just get everybody together and say, "Okay, we're going to do this," and everybody would go out and do it.
So that's what was happening.
We had traffic and then we didn't have traffic.
And you're attributing that to the lack of leadership in the group at that time?
At that time, yeah.
there was no cohesive structure that i could see And I think if you go down a little bit more...
You'll see those comments that you just mentioned.
Still some mob rule going on.
Hoping they have an established command structure soon.
You visited Smuggler's Saloon and met with some protesters on February 3rd.
Yes, I did.
And did you observe for yourself this lack of leadership at that time?
I did.
I talked to Alex Van Herc.
Who turned out being one of the people that became a de facto leader, I guess.
And the expression, I've heard it used here before, talking about other places, it was like herding cats.
Him trying to get some order out of the chaos that was going on.
There's video that exists of him.
Talking to people and trying to get them to listen to him and being shouted down because that was the nature of the beast at the time.
Okay.
If we could go to page 10 of this document.
So this is February 5th at 2.16.
So you see that second bubble.
You say, now that Marco seems to have established control, it might be good for someone to talk about provincial...
And then if we go just down just a little bit, she responds, let's chat later.
So is your understanding that at this time on February 5th, a clearer leadership structure was emerging in the group?
Yes.
Okay.
And did you have a discussion with Minister Sani regarding provincial mandates at that time?
It's quite possible.
We had phone calls in here, but you've seen how good my memory is.
I know we talked about it from time to time, what could be done and what was being done.
But I'm under oath and I can't say for sure.
Okay.
Thank you.
If we can go just a bit, just to page 12, and this is February 5th at 11.59.
So just a bit lower till we get to 11.59.
There we go.
Here you tell Minister Sani that the messaging to the protesters needs to be controlled better.
There seems to be conflicting messages being circulated as true.
You recall that?
Yes.
And what was the problem with the messaging at that time as you understood it?
The feeling that I was getting was that someone was building up hopes.
That things are going to happen on a provincial level very quickly, and the Premier is going to announce that all the mandates are off.
We knew government doesn't work that quickly.
Premier Kenney was the old expression, caught between a rock and a hard place.
He's definitely there because we know all the stuff that goes on.
He was working to remove as many mandates as possible as quickly as possible.
But a lot of these people were being told that there was going to be a caucus meeting and they were going to drop all the mandates.
and don't know where that came from exactly.
If we can go to page 14, it's February 6th at 2.40 p.m.
So you say that you talked to Mayor Fader, and I believe that's the mayor of Fort McLeod, is that right?
That's correct.
And Glenn Motz, who's a federal MP, correct?
These are MP for that writing.
And you say you talked to...
Marco was not in favour of the legal action, has been working to move toward a legal protest.
And when you say moving towards working towards a legal protest, did you understand that to be opening one lane each way?
Yes.
And were those efforts successful?
Again, it depends on the time of day and which way the wind was blowing.
Sometimes it was...
My son came down from Edmonton one day, from Calgary rather, came down from Calgary one day and after he got through the checkpoint in Milk River, he drove into Cootes.
He said, "There's no trucks out there." So they were shifting and moving things around.
So sometimes the road was open and sometimes it wasn't.
Thank you.
Thank you.
If we can go to page 15, February 7th at 1020.
I believe it's at the bottom of the page.
So Minister Sani says, I heard the blockade is back up.
And you respond.
We could go to the next page, I believe.
You say, yep, tractors just now.
Highway is blocked.
If we keep going.
Keep going.
She says, I guess they were hoping for an announcement today.
Was your understanding that this tractor blockade on February 7th was because of frustrations associated with the lack of an anticipated announcement as you were?
Just mentioning.
That's the word that I got from talking to someone else.
That they'd been expecting the announcement to come down that all the mandates were off.
And again, this is from misinformation they were getting from somewhere.
And when they didn't, they blocked the road again.
And this is a member of the protest who told you this?
Yes.
So, the next day on February 8, Premier Kenney announced a plan for the gradual easing of pandemic-related health orders.
Did that have any impact on the blockade?
Not by then.
As I said, they had been told.
And led to believe that everything was going to come off.
And obviously it didn't.
And so those people who chose not to understand how government works decided they're going to come to show us.
Blocked it again.
We can go to page 19. This is on February 8th.
We can go down a little bit.
Down a bit more.
So you say, need access to some land, no construction.
And then on page 20, if we can skip down, Minister Sani says, I'm glad we could help you out with the land parcel.
Was that in connection with the plot of land for the legal?
Yes.
Yes, I'd been in the meeting in Milk River with the mayor from Milk River, Reeve from the County of Warner, some representatives from, trying to think who else was in there.
Anyway, we had had a meeting and a discussion of where to have an alternate parcel of land.
The Milk River people and the county determined that there was Queensland available.
And so I happened to have the contact information for the Minister of Transport who could make that happen.
And that's what happened here.
I gave her the note that they'd be calling her.
They did.
She made things happen so we could get that parcel.
And did you understand, was there any buy-in from protesters on moving the protests to that site?
No, at that time there wasn't a great deal of interest in moving from the highway to a plot of land just beside the highway.
And I understand, though, that once the blockade in Coutts came to an end...
There is a group that moved to that site, correct?
And they stayed there for a number of weeks?
For a long time.
And it looked like an unhoused encampment.
So, let's go to page 26, February 14th at 12:42 p.m.
So, Minister Sani asks you, are there people still there at the blockade?
You respond, oh yeah, nobody's leaving yet.
It's all fake news.
So, your understanding at that time was that the protesters were not leaving yet, correct?
That's correct.
I didn't hear until later in the afternoon that things were changing.
And what did you hear that afternoon?
Sometime in the afternoon or early evening, I think it was my contact with RCMP.
Corporal Peters let me know that they'd been notified the thing was coming to an end.
So you were told by the RCMP that they had been notified by protesters that day that they would be leaving the site?
yeah And I understand you had a conversation with Mr. Jory Evans, who was a protester about that as well.
When did you have the conversation with him about this decision to end the blockade?
Sometime on the 14th, but I don't...
Without pulling it up, I don't have the exact time.
Well, I'm not sure times were on there or not.
Yeah, we were in contact quite a bit that day.
Jory, I still don't know his real position in the group, but he was doing a lot of videoing.
He had a blog online and so on called PB&J.
Just kind of a news summary of what was going on, what they knew, what they didn't know.
And he and I had established a rapport early on and communicated back and forth.
Obviously nothing confidential, but talking about stuff.
So he had let me know that day.
First of all, contacted me to know if I knew how to contact the person who had been arrested.
And then we went on from there.
And he's talked about the guns or the arrest and the guns.
Guns are all fake.
But the fact that people don't want anything to do with it.
So he explained to you that day that he spoke to you about the RCMP's arrest, and did he explain to you that that was one of the reasons why the protesters had decided to leave?
Yeah, that's the feeling I got.
I don't know if he actually said that or not.
In my mind, at this point in the time, it's, well, yeah, that's what he said.
Unless I see it in writing, I'm not going to say for sure.
I got that feeling, though, that because of what had happened, that the mood in the crowd had changed and they were going to depart.
Okay.
And was your understanding that the agreement was that they would, or that their intention was to leave the next morning?
Yes.
And did you observe them leave the morning of the 15th?
I did, actually, yeah.
And so no enforcement was required by the RCMP at that time to get them to leave?
No.
On the night of the 14th, they lined up all their vehicles down the street.
We have an auction firm out there called Ritchie Brothers that auction off from time to time a lot of agricultural equipment.
And I said it looked like the biggest sale that Ritchie Brothers had ever had because they were all lined up.
And it was mostly tractors.
At that point, there weren't a lot of trucks around.
But anyway, they lined up down the street on the 14th and I received the word they're going to go at 10 and 10 o 'clock they were gone.
Well, they left.
And so you're not aware of any enforcement powers available under the Emergencies Act being used to clear the blockade then?
No, that had nothing to do with it.
When you met with the protesters at Smuggler's Saloon on February 3rd, did they explain to you what their plan was, what their objective was?
No.
No, there was no...
I talked to Alex briefly in the back room, just off the main floor there, and I've never seen a man look so haggard.
And beat as he did at that time.
I don't know if I got there just after he had tried to talk to people.
Marco says he was there, but Marco was avoiding me.
So anyway, he's on video talking about we should, as one, leave and getting shouted down.
So I don't know if I talked to him just after that or not, but...
No, there was no...
I've talked so long I forgot the question.
I was asking you about February 3rd when you attended the Smuggler's Saloon.
Did you get a sense that they had an exit strategy?
Oh, at that time, no.
No, the feeling that I got was...
From talking to a couple of other people in the crowd was, "We're here till mandates are off." If we could go to COU6012, these are your Facebook messages with Mr. Evans.
And I'd like to go to page two.
And I'd like to go to page two.
We can go down a little bit.
Okay, so here he tells you, and I think this is in the context of the mandates.
The provincial mandates, yeah, they keep ignoring, and these guys want to get this shit done and go home.
Also connected with the group that closed down Windsor, Ontario today, and things are going crazy in Ottawa.
So it adds flames to that fire over there.
In your discussions with Mr. Evans, did you ever understand that the, were the protesters in coots, Communications with protesters in Ottawa or Windsor?
What was your understanding of that?
This is my understanding of that.
I have no other...
We never talked about it otherwise.
Okay, so this text message is all you have.
Okay, thank you.
I understand that Mr. Evans told you about concerns he had with respect to more extreme elements participating in the protest.
Can you tell us about that?
Oh, yeah.
We had a meeting where I talked for quite a bit, for 45 minutes or so.
And one of the things...
If you go back far enough in my history, bear with me.
Go back far enough in my history, I worked in mining in northern Manitoba, was a steelworker, was a steelworker steward, went through wildcat strikes and so on.
And there were always hardline guys and then the guys that were there for...
A good time.
You could have a wildcat strike and everybody's up and up and up and then it tapered off and you wound up with the core and you might even find guys that you've never seen before there.
And we talked about how that was a danger and if something like this, the longer it went on, the more the opportunity existed for outside elements to come in and cause disruption.
And he agreed with that.
That was one of his concerns.
Did you yourself observe the nature of the protests changing over time?
The mood changed.
I talked about somewhere it being almost like a big community meeting.
Of all the farmers in the area.
And this was, don't kid yourself to think this is a big trucker protest.
This is mostly a farm protest.
I think in your witness statement you say that about your meeting on February 4th.
Yeah.
And, you know, they had their kids there and it was just a family thing.
As it went on, a lot of that Attitude disappeared.
Didn't see a lot of kids playing hockey anymore.
And if you followed their social media, they took a picture when it was all over or just before they left, which was handy for anybody investigating, but a picture of the whole group in front of smugglers.
And it wasn't a large group at that time.
It's gotten smaller.
But to go back to my strike days, it's the same thing.
The longer you do something like this and you go in expecting results right away and it doesn't happen, the more disheartened you become.
And then you start listening to...
Other things about, well, if we only did this, this would happen, and so on.
So it's just a typical demonstration.
And while I didn't have a crystal ball, if I had, it would have paid off, because what we feared seems to have happened.
Did you observe any violence or harassment during the protest?
Never did, no.
Did you yourself receive any threats?
Yes.
I got one death threat online, Facebook.
Serious enough that the RCMP took it seriously.
I'm not sure how good a threat it was because it was sent from a personal page.
But anyway, it was a death threat.
And I received calls.
Everybody gets phone calls.
Just the phone and hang up or phone and, yeah, you thought you wanted to be mayor.
You know, click.
That kind of stuff.
I had people out front taking pictures of my house, and it was the first time I've done this, so it was a little nerve-wracking.
Thank you.
Did you ever observe any weapons yourself around that time in Kootz?
No, we didn't.
Some of the protesters were staying in the motel across the road from where I live, and we saw from time to time them moving heavy hockey bags, and my wife said, "It's guns!" But we had no weapons that I ever witnessed.
Did you ever hear anything about efforts by protesters to dissuade...
Tow truck drivers from assisting the RCMP?
Not directly.
on social media I saw what was going on but I never directly talked to anyone.
Did you ever have any discussions with CBSA officials about the protest?
Never did.
Other than see somebody at the post office or something.
Some of them live there.
I understand that the RCMP attended a village council meeting on February 8th.
In your summary, you state that they describe their responses building the airplane while you're flying it.
What did you understand those comments to be referring to?
Well, just the way it sounds.
As I said, we all got caught flat-footed.
Nobody had expected this to happen.
And the...
I'm not sure if it's...
But anyway, the answer to the question was we're building the airplane as we're flying it.
We're making it up as we go along.
We've got tactics and we're trying them.
And if they don't work, we try something else until we find out how it works.
It was an education, I guess, for everyone.
Thank you.
In the short time we have left...
I'd just like to talk about the impact on the village and its residents.
In the summer, you say that the blockade greatly disrupted everyday life for Coutts residents.
Could you maybe explain to us in what ways?
I have done a mental survey and I think I had about...
A 70-30 split in the village, the 30 on my side and the 70 supporting the protest, regardless of what it meant.
We still have neighbors that won't talk to each other because of the...
The protest.
They didn't get out.
We had a lot of collaborators, not collaborators, sympathetic people in the village who figured it was our duty to feed everybody.
If they need a room, give them a room.
These are all good people and we should really look after them As Unneighable Unneighborly and heartless as it seems, my opinion was if you came down here and you've blockaded the highway and now you're not wanting to leave the protest but you need your medication that you left at home, the road goes that way, go get your medication.
Instead of making a public scene about I don't have my medicine, can you bring it to me?
We don't have food, you know?
You've got food at home.
That was my answer to those kind of complaints.
My neighbors, being good rural Alberta people, figure somebody's in need.
You look after them regardless of how they got there, I guess.
And there was a lot of sympathy over the...
And as I said, the driving force of the protest.
The original cause had to do with cross-border vaccination.
And then it mutated into my body, my right, my, you know, all of the different conspiracy things that have gone on.
And then people didn't let that go.
And so it still exists to this day.
How significantly did the protests interfere with residents' ability to access services in Milk River?
Dependent on the person.
How comfortable they were with driving past monster pieces of equipment.
I think we heard Marco yesterday talk about how one tractor is intimidating even if it's sitting still if you haven't been around them.
When you get a whole row of them, some of them idling, you've got trucks, big pieces of equipment, and you're out there in your little Prius wanting to go up to Milk River to get groceries, it can be very intimidating.
Other people who have a lot of retired farmers, it didn't bother them that much.
I had one guy just the other day say, "You're going to testify.
Be sure you tell them we were never blocked in." Could always make it up there.
Had to drive through the field a couple of times, but we weren't really blockaded.
So it depended on the person and how they could handle it.
And it affected some people.
I have a friend who is a veteran of Afghanistan and she has PTSD.
They had to leave town because it triggered her PTSD and she just couldn't take it.
They're back now.
Older people had one lady who would, if somebody drove her out for a doctor's appointment or something, she would curl up in a ball.
I wasn't going to do this.
But it just depends on the person, how they grew up.
What their situations are.
Some people, it really bothered.
Thank you.
Did you hear any reports of intimidation of some of your residents by protesters?
A couple, and you take it as, you know, take everything with a grain of sand, a grain of sand, grain of salt.
I had a couple of people tell me that they were coming back into Coutts and being stopped by protesters and saying, they say to the guy, "What do you think?
Should we let these people through or not?
Or should we let this guy through?
And, you know, where do you think you're going?" and that kind of thing.
But nothing...
We had a situation where a neighbor, someone decided it'd be funny to tell everybody that there were free showers at her house, so she had people showing up at the door.
That kind of thing.
But not a lot of, there was no physical intimidation.
And it was basically just the...
The going through the gauntlet to get out of the village.
Like I said, if you drove through and up the highway and through the ditch, maybe, well, you could go.
And lastly, I just wanted to ask you, was there any impact on emergency services or access to emergency services?
For the most part, no.
When it first happened, it was like when we had the RVs.
The entrances, they said they wouldn't block it.
You have to understand, we depend on the ambulance coverage from Milk River, the medical clinic there.
We have a volunteer fire department, we have volunteer EMS, and you'd have to understand AHS, the health services, to know why we have an ambulance that we can't use.
But anyway, we have one.
We cover...
Our fire department then is a rural fire department that covers everything out in the surrounding area, especially to the east.
There's only that road at 501, which is the road that crosses the tracks to get out to there.
That was one of my major concerns was that we had egress.
Quickly in the event of an emergency, and then that we could get an ambulance in.
The RCMP ran an ambulance down the highway to test that, and the protesters were able to clear it through quickly.
So it was handled.
But for the first few hours, there wasn't any awareness on the part of the people.
I said more than once, I got the impression that the protesters' coots was an afterthought.
They wanted to plug the highway, and oh gee, there's 250 people over here, and we kind of affected them too.
So it took us a while to work that out, but after everybody was made aware, things were fairly good.
Thank you so much.
Those are my questions.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay, so first up is the Government of Canada, please.
Thank you.
Thank you, Commissioner.
Good morning, Mayor Willett.
Good morning.
My name is Andrea Gonsalves, and I'm one of the lawyers representing the Government of Canada in this inquiry.
Thank you for being here today.
I just have a few questions for you.
And I want to start by talking about the port of entry at Coutts.
And I understand on the other side of the border is the town of Sweetgrass, yes?
Sweetgrass, yes.
That port of entry, you'll agree with me, is of vital importance to not only the Coutts community, Milk River, the surrounding communities, but also the province of Alberta and Canada as a whole.
Yes.
I understand that Highway 4 is the primary access to that port of entry, although there's one side road that's not suitable for commercial vehicles, right?
Correct.
And it's the only designated commercial port of entry in all of Alberta?
Yeah, it's the only 24-hour port, yes.
Right.
That port of entry allows for the cross-border transport of livestock, agricultural goods, and other imports and exports that are critical to Alberta's supply chain and economy.
Yes.
And I, I, And you can see, I assume from really your front door, the constant flow of trucks that are carrying billions of dollars worth of goods north and south across that border.
Yes.
Now, you've told us that you learned...
Early on of plans to, that there were plans in the works for protesters to engage in slow roll protests in the vicinity of the Coutts Board of Entry?
That's correct.
And those quickly evolved into plans to actually block the highway to the border?
Yes.
And that would have really a two-fold impact on the people of Cootes, both their access north into Milk River and the amenities there, right?
Yep.
As well as south down across the border.
And so I would expect this raised some alarms for you as mayor of this village.
Yes.
Yeah, and you acted quickly to communicate to residents how they...
could best prepare themselves, right?
You sent out that little notice.
Yes, I did.
Yeah, it's COU701.
I don't think we need to pull it out unless you want to look at it, but you were trying to best equip your residents for the That's correct.
And that notice included advice like pretending that they live in a big city.
Yeah.
What did you mean by that?
With the risk of giving too much away, a lot of people don't lock their doors.
You might have a car that you know so-and-so needs to borrow.
You'll put the keys in the car.
We've got an almost zero percent crime rate because of our location and because of the fact that CBSA people live there.
The guy that you broke into might have a gun.
So just people get very comfortable with its typical small-town Alberta.
And there were folks coming in that nobody knew, and you were concerned that that might pose a safety and security risk to the people of Cootes.
Yeah, it's...
Like I tell a lot of people, you're driving south, getting ready to hit the border, you don't even know Coutts is there.
And although we can watch and wave.
And if you've got a stranger in town, word gets around, you know, there's a car going around and I don't know who it belongs to, and oh, that's so-and-so, they're visiting so-and-so.
You know, the telegraph works very well.
All of a sudden, we're going with a potential existed that we're going to have massive influx of people driving up and down the streets.
And I just wanted everybody to be careful.
Don't let your kids out to run across to the playground because somebody might be coming, not looking for kids there.
Everybody in town knows your kids live there, but if they come in from out of town, they don't.
A heightened awareness, I guess, of your situation.
Okay, and another step you took in the early stages was to reach out to the provincial government.
Yes.
We saw in your examination by Commission Council the January 27th email that you wrote to Solicitor General Savage to advise of the planned protest.
Do you recall that?
And one of the things you mentioned...
In that email, you raised the possibility of the situation being dealt with using Alberta's Critical Infrastructure Protection Act.
Do you remember that?
Absolutely.
And I understand that was raised on January 29th in a letter you sent to the Minister of Justice and on January 30th in an email to Premier Kenney.
Do you recall those communications?
Yes.
Okay, and I'll just note for the record, but we don't have to pull them up.
It's COU 705 and COU 706.
And in your understanding, that legislation was really purpose-built for this kind of thing.
Exactly.
Now, you've spoken a bit about the disruptions that the blockade of the highway caused for the people of...
And I just wanted to pull up some photos.
It's pb.nsc.can408500-rel.301.
You mentioned that you did travel to the protest sites on occasion.
I just want to confirm that these photos reflect or are similar to what you recall seeing when you were there.
Apologies.
Could you repeat that document ID, please?
Yeah, the whole thing.
PB.nsc.can.408500_rel.301.
And we'll begin, please, at page four.
Now, this is an RCMP document, so I wouldn't expect you've seen the document before.
It's just the photos.
Is that a picture of the blockade at Coutts, best you can recognize?
Or up on Highway 4?
Bear with me.
I'll just make that a little bigger there.
I can't place that exactly.
It doesn't actually look like the Coutts end of it.
It looks more like the Milk River.
Milk River end of it.
Okay.
I think that's the 501.
Okay.
And what we see there, though, is there are trucks parked in the median between the two directions of the highway?
Yeah, but again, this is actually not a full blockade.
They're doing a slow roll through that.
That's a slow roll.
Yeah.
Okay, let's go down to page 7, please.
Okay, that's Coutts.
That's Coutts.
And page 9. Yeah, those are both Coutts.
okay and let's go to page 10 please Oh, sorry.
It's not the one I wanted.
Latre 29. Are you able to place that one?
That may be checkpoint 10. It doesn't get any bigger.
If you don't recognize it, that's okay.
We'll have others.
I don't for sure know where I am there.
Okay, that's okay.
It may be further down the highway than you were able to make your way to.
Now you discussed your interactions with Corporal Curtis Peters.
And we have those text exchanges at COU6011.
In one of your text exchanges, you asked him to speak to the school bus driver.
I just want to be clear on this.
Children from Coutts attend school in Milk River?
That's correct.
And in this text message, you're explaining that the weather is supposed to turn bad.
And you were concerned about her traveling on the highway and folks having to navigate a field to drop off and retrieve their kids.
Can you just explain that concern?
Yeah, the school bus driver was a little concerned with coming through the blockade.
And so what she had offered as a solution...
Was to come basically the back way on a county road up to Patty Joels that we talked about.
But the fact is that you have to drive either through there or through the field, and she didn't feel comfortable taking the bus through there.
So what she had suggested was that the people in town who had kids would bring them all out and meet her on the county road.
And that's what that was.
Okay.
You also mentioned in your text to Corporal Peters that folks on home care in Cootes had not been visited since the blockade started.
That's correct.
And that was one of your concerns.
It was.
I want to pull up, please, COU 702.
This is a text exchange you had with Bill Graveland, and that's who?
I'm sorry?
Bill Graveland.
Oh, Bill Graveland, yeah.
He is a reporter for Canadian Press.
Okay.
And if we go to page three, please.
Just scrolling down there.
Okay, stop there.
In the first blue box, your text says, morning, Bill.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
You need to find someone in a protected position to call these guys what they are.
Domestic terrorists won't be me.
They're right outside my window.
I would be strung up.
Literally, just a thought.
Why did you describe the protesters as domestic terrorists?
Well, unlike...
Most of the people in the front rows here, I'm a Google lawyer.
So when I look for the definition of a domestic terrorist, these people seem to fit that bill, and yet no one ever labeled them that.
And so I just floated the idea out there.
One side to Bill, on the other side to Minister Sani, that maybe they should be called that to get a little more attention.
You felt they were terrorizing people by their behavior?
Because they were causing harm to the country.
And if we go down to page four, If we could scroll down a little bit more, just pause there.
Sorry, again, a little bit further down.
I know it may be off.
There's a text where you, if we could just go back up, let me try again.
Up a little more.
Yeah.
Okay, I'm not seeing it.
There is a text in this collection where you say that a more extreme element has moved in, and I am concerned about the final outcome.
Does that sound familiar to you?
Yeah.
In your interview summary, you spoke about a sermon delivered on February 3rd at the Smuggler's Saloon by a pastor, Arthur Pawlowski.
Yes.
And he, have you seen that sermon?
Yes, I have.
Could we please pull up pb.can.40, I hope this is right, 1845 underscore rel.0001.
Was that pb.can.401845?
I hope so.
Is it a multimedia file?
Yes.
Yeah.
Well, we're digging that up.
That sermon, I understand, was delivered on a day when MLA Hunter had told you he had negotiated a deal with protesters to open up one lane of traffic.
You recall that?
I think that's right, yeah.
Text message to Minister Sawney.
You described this sermon as being inciting.
As being...
Inciting.
Inciting, yes.
Yeah.
And in your interview summary, you said that it strengthened the protesters' resolve.
You recall that?
Yep.
I'm hoping we can just watch a few...
Sorry, having difficulty locating that one.
Okay.
I want to come back to it.
You told us that you also received a death threat, other threats, and that a truck was parked outside your house taking photos of it, correct?
Yeah.
And it's fair to say that as time is going on, frustration is increasing as is concern over how this may end, right?
Yep.
And your efforts to engage higher levels of government were focused really on the province of Alberta?
That's correct.
Did you ever receive any explanation for why the province did not make use of the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act, as you had suggested?
No, I did not.
But you have to remember, I'm the mayor of a small village.
I'm kind of at the bottom of the ladder.
So I was not privy to everything that was going on.
Okay.
And I now have the correct reference for that video.
It's pb.can.40135.
1835.
1835.
And Mayor, while we're waiting for that to be pulled up in the few minutes I have left, you're aware that what was going on in Coutts was not isolated, right?
There were also border blockades, the port of entry at Emerson, Ambassador Bridge in Windsor.
Pacific Highway near Surrey, BC.
Yes.
of course the occupation of the city of Ottawa.
You said 1835?
1835, yeah.
And you said earlier, I thought I heard your evidence that In some respects, it was a typical demonstration, but of course, as time went on, you wouldn't describe the Coutts border blockade as being a typical demonstration.
Yeah.
Excuse me.
Sorry.
Just to step in, David Cherokee, Council for the Government of Canada.
I believe that it's pb.can.401835.
I think there may have been an NSC in the previous reading, but there's no NSC.
It's just pb.can.
Thank you, Mr. Shiroki.
It is here.
I just need to download it.
It'll just be a moment.
Okay.
Thank you.
I think I can do the rest of my questions and come back to that.
And, of course, you're aware, Mayor, that ultimately search warrants were carried out the morning of February 14th.
Yes.
And a cache of weapons and body armor was seized.
Yes.
And there were a number of arrests made, right?
Yes.
And you were informed, in addition to these arrests, an attempt was made by a vehicle to ram a police vehicle?
Yep.
Again, we don't have to pull it up while Mr. Clerk is doing me another favour, but the email to you about those arrests is COU50453.
And even with those arrests, I think I understood your evidence that it took some time for the protesters to clear out.
Well, sometime.
It happened on the 14th, and they left on the 15th.
Right, and that was after the Emergencies Act had been invoked, right?
Just barely, yeah.
And you mentioned in your witness summary, you understood there were rumors circulating among the protesters that the Emergencies Act would be invoked, and among other things, their bank accounts could be frozen, right?
Yep.
Again, that was social media, but yes.
Okay, so Mr. Commissioner, I'm just waiting for that video to load.
Okay.
Okay.
Apologies, just one more moment.
That's okay.
It's my fault.
And we'll just play.
from the beginning, not the whole thing.
People in my country, in 1980, finally, they said our children are worth fighting for.
Yes.
And they did it, and they took it to the streets and they paralyzed the entire system.
Yes, thousands were arrested.
They gained control.
Yes, people were tortured and beaten, yes.
There is a prize attached to freedom.
How do you think the second war ended?
Millions had to die.
How do you think the first war ended?
Millions had to die.
And that's the price that we have to be willing to pay if our children are going to have a free and democratic society.
This is our time.
For two years we have been dancing polka with them.
For two years we have been trying our best to reason with the villains.
But I know villains.
See, bully will never stop bullying.
He will keep stealing from you all the time.
They have big appetites, those greedy dogs.
We can pause that then.
Thank you.
Mayor Willett, is that video of the sermon that Pastor Pulaski delivered at the Smuggler Saloon on February 3rd?
It is, yes.
And that's the video you understand, or you've described as inciting the crowd and the protesters.
Thank you.
Those are my questions.
Thank you, Commissioner.
Okay, thank you.
Next is the Government of Alberta.
Government of Alberta, can you see and hear me?
Yes, we can.
Yes.
Perfect.
Good morning Mayor Willett.
I have a few questions for you.
Can you just identify yourself for the record?
You may have but it didn't come across.
Of course Commissioner.
Honolora Yamamoto for the province of Alberta.
Mr. Clerk if you could please bring up WTS 6012.
It's been up before.
This is your witness statement.
Okay.
And just while that's coming up, so on page 5, you stated that you did not receive the type of support you expected from the provincial and federal governments.
So what kind of support did you expect from the federal government?
Well, at that point, it seemed like we were not getting anywhere and I was looking for Somebody to do something to get the highway unblocked and get things happening again.
So any kind of support would have been make them go away and make this end.
I wasn't in a position to say exactly who should do what, but somebody should appear to be doing something in it.
At this time, it didn't look like anybody was doing much.
Okay.
And so I have the same question with respect to the provincial government.
What kind of support did you expect from the provincial government?
Same story.
We had, as I mentioned before, an act that was supposed to give unlimited powers, basically, to protect infrastructure and I didn't remedy this exact problem, and yet it appeared to me nothing was going on.
Now, I've seen the situation reports since then that show that there was action in the background, but I wasn't privy to that.
So, where I was sitting in my office looking out the window, I didn't see anything happening.
Okay, so now that you say that there's things that you saw going on in the background, In your opinion, is that statement still true, that you believe that the provincial government should have made better use of the Critical Infrastructure Act?
I guess it goes back to the statement that the RCMP made to me about building the airplane as we're flying it.
I understand that the province was in the same situation.
Looking for tow trucks and that kind of thing.
So, probably my opinion is not as harsh as it was at the time.
I believe the province was doing more than was visible to me and most people.
There were things going on that were...
If we'd gone a little farther down the road, no pun intended, if we'd gone a little farther down the road, there would have been actual physical action taken.
So my opinion has changed a bit.
Thank you, Mayor.
So, you understand as well that the RCMP was the lead agency responsible for responding to the border blockade occurring at Coups and they would make the operational plans and decisions?
I don't know, is my ears playing tricks or not?
Can you do that a little slower, please?
I apologize.
I should slow down for the translator as well.
So, you understand that the RCMP… Would have been the lead agency responsible for responding to the border blockades occurring at COOTS and they would have made the operational plans and decisions?
Correct.
Okay.
And you worked with the RCMP throughout this blockade?
We were in contact all the time, yeah.
Okay.
So, Mr. Clerk, if I could help you pull up ALB50908.
point zero zero zero one.
So what you're going to see here is a statement from the Alberta Minister of Justice and Solicitor General Savage on February 8th, 2022.
Now the fourth and fifth paragraphs from the bottom is just where we want to go.
Perfect.
And it says: Those participating in this illegal blockade could potentially face charges or actions under any number of laws including and it includes the Critical Infrastructure Defense Act and goes on to say whatever action law enforcement may take is at their independent discretion.
I trust the authorities to lay appropriate charges wherever the evidence provides reasonable grounds to do so.
So, based on that statement, do you now understand that it's the RCMP that would have made decisions whether or not to undertake enforcement under the Critical Infrastructure Defence Act?
Correct.
I understand that.
We saw your texts with Minister Sawney.
We don't have to pull them up.
But those would be under COU 6016.
So, these texts show contact every day, often multiple times a day from February 2nd to 18th, as well as you said you had phone calls with Minister Sawney?
Yes.
Okay.
And you also had a phone call with the Premier?
I did.
And at no time did you make requests for specific supports or assistance from the province?
I think when I talked to the Premier, we talked more in generalities.
As I said earlier, he was kind of caught in a pinch point between darned if I do and darned if I don't.
We talked about that.
He talked about the fact that he could only Do so much because of the lack of surge capacity in the hospitals.
He mentioned that he was going to be talking to governors in the northern states to see if they would put pressure on on that side, because even if we did get rid of the provincial mandates, the federal mandates.
Still sat there and that was the thing that triggered the whole deal in the first place.
So, no, it was more a generality thing.
I did not hit him up for any kind of action.
But based on that conversation, there were things that the Alberta government was doing to support removing the border blockade at Coups.
And again, I only caught about half of that.
I'm deaf in one ear and I can't hear in the other one.
I apologize.
I'll slow down and speak up.
And based on that conversation with Premier Kenney, Alberta was providing support, even if you weren't asking for specific supports, correct?
Yes.
And you had wanted Minister Sawney to speak with protesters?
It was not my suggestion.
It was her suggestion.
She thought that she could come and talk to people in the first day or two because she was getting feedback from the fact that there are truckers stuck.
She wanted to come and...
I don't know what she had planned to say, but it was her suggestion that she come down.
Okay.
And you had said that the protesters were like herding cats?
The protesters were letting...
Were like herding cats.
Sorry, excuse me.
Yeah, that's what Alex told me when the first time I made contact with the guys at Smugglers.
He said at that time that it was like, that's my expression, but that was the impression.
He said he'd get a group here and a group there and try and get them all together and they'd make a decision.
Then they'd walk out the door and forgot what they talked about.
So he was very frustrated.
So there was no definitive leader of the protest?
At that point, there didn't appear to be.
And I just have one point of clarification.
So in your evidence with my friend Commission Council, you said that tractors lined up on the side of the road on the 14th.
And I just want to clarify, that's so traffic could flow?
Oh, but then they were off the highway and...
I think at that point, traffic was being held up in Milk River still, but there wasn't any really physical blockading going on on the morning of the 15th, possibly on the evening of the 14th.
I couldn't do 24-hour coverage.
But no, the tractors were all lined up.
They were just getting ready to leave as a group, and so they pulled them all.
I actually pulled them into the village and down that street and lined them up along there so they were out of the way.
Okay, and you're not sure if that was the evening of the 14th or did that start the evening of the 14th where they were moving the tractors?
When I went down the morning of the 15th to see what was going on, they were all lined up down the street.
That's all I do.
I don't know exactly when.
Like I say, I wasn't sitting watching them.
24 hours a day, so I'm not sure when they moved.
Okay, perfect.
Thank you, Mayor Willett.
That's all my questions.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Next is the City of Windsor.
Good morning, Mayor Willett.
My name is Michael Finley.
I represent the City of Windsor, which, as I'm sure you're aware, is a fellow border municipality.
Yes.
And we heard today, Mayor Willett, you live just blocks away from the protest site and indeed the border, right?
No matter where you are in Coutts, you're only blocks away.
And that border crossing is an important link, true?
It definitely is.
And I think you described it earlier as a lifeline and something with larger importance than just to the village of Coutts.
Is that fair?
That's correct.
And I guess, perhaps I'm stating the obvious, sir, but fair to say that the village of Coots doesn't have sufficient resources on its own to ensure the security of that border crossing?
No.
Or, in fact, to deal with a blockade of the magnitude that you faced earlier this year?
No.
Our police force, as you heard, is four or five officers stationed in Milk River.
Right.
RCMP.
And so, a situation like that requires more than a local response.
Is that fair?
Correct.
Including, I think, as you noted earlier, provincial support?
Yeah.
And federal support too?
Yeah, well, it's RCMB, so it's provincial and federal.
And so, that being so, would you agree that one might benefit from having a plan or at least a framework in advance?
To deal with situations like the one you experienced, even if they're not exactly the same in future?
Sure, yeah.
It would be nice.
The old hindsight's 20 /20, but it would have been nice to have a plan, yeah.
I think you spoke about being caught flat-footed and building an airplane while it's...
Flying, I guess we can agree.
You sticking with that metaphor is probably better to have the plane assembled in advance before it takes to the air.
Yeah.
If we're talking about police response, they had response for certain situations, but this was a situation that was unique at the time to anything they'd...
And so I'm not going to be an apologist for the RCMP, but I think they were doing well under the circumstances.
I don't think it's fair to say they had no plan.
They would have had plans for demonstrations and so on.
Just nothing of this magnitude.
Right.
And I suppose all I'm getting at is it's better in this type of circumstance.
I hope you'll agree with me.
When you have a multi-jurisdictional issue to deal with, to have some plan in advance to address it.
Yep.
Well, thank you, sir.
Those are all my questions.
Yep.
Thank you.
Next are the convoy organizers.
Good morning, Mayor.
For the record, Brendan Miller appearing as Council for Freedom Corp, which represents the protesters that were in the City of Ottawa in January and February.
How are you doing?
Good.
How are you?
Long flight.
I love driving through Coots.
Yeah.
So, beautiful part of the country.
So, if we could please bring up, it's the document that my friends have already referred to from the federal government.
It's the Canadian Canada document ending 8500 that was just up.
Do you have the full DOC ID?
Yes, I do.
It is pb.nsc.can.00008500.
zero.
Okay, could we please scroll to page 32?
It's just loading still.
There we go.
Okay.
So this is the document my friend put to you.
It's a PowerPoint put together by the RCMP.
And there you can see that they are doing what they refer to as Community engagement and talking and listening to protesters, supporters and residents of Coots.
Did you witness any of that?
Not personally.
Only online.
Right.
But you ended up going and speaking to the protesters yourself too, didn't you?
Yes.
Right.
And I understand that when you did that, you ended up doing an interview with CTV and City News about that experience.
Do you remember that?
I don't.
Okay.
Well, let me ask you if you remember saying this.
I just want to put this.
This is a statement that's been attributed to you.
I wasn't negotiating or anything else.
I was just there to find out if they were as bad as some people have said, and they're certainly not.
Do you remember saying that?
Sounds like something I would say, yeah.
And do you remember saying this?
What about the protesters?
They're the same guys that I have for neighbors.
That was part of the uniqueness of this whole demonstration, yeah.
Right.
And you also said they're the guy that owns the farm up on the hill, the guy that hauls for local businesses.
Remember saying that?
Probably did.
Right.
And this situation, I understand, polarized your community.
The community was essentially divided by half-supporting.
Half against the truckers.
Is that fair?
As I said earlier, probably 70-30.
70-30.
On a good day, yeah.
Right.
And was that 70-30 in support, or which one was in the 30 and 70?
That would have been supporting the protest.
70%?
Or 30% supporting the protest?
No, 70. 70%.
Okay, so majority of your town.
Majority of the town was the feeling I got.
Yeah.
And there was signs up and flags of all kinds that were on residences of your town's property.
Is that fair?
A few, yeah.
And can you tell me about some of the ones you saw and describe them?
I know some of them were a bit vulgar, but if you'd like to.
Everybody is seeing them.
The Trudeau flags.
The ones say F Trudeau?
Yes.
Okay.
Some of the Gadsden flags that don't tread on me.
A lot of Canadian flags, many of them inverted, which I wholeheartedly do not approve of.
Yeah, and those flags were in your own community, put up on the property of your own residence.
A lot of U.S. flags.
And because you're right on the border with Montana there, right?
There is an intersect between the population in Montana and Coutts.
Is that fair?
Yep.
Yeah.
And can you explain, how long have you been in rural Alberta politics?
In rural Alberta politics?
Since I was elected to council, we had this discussion.
Five years ago.
Okay.
And what's the vibe you get or the interactions you have with your residents with respect to their support or lack of support for the federal government as it currently is composed?
Well, I'll quote my CAO, Trudeau hates us.
And that's basically, you can talk to anybody there.
There's a great dislike for the federal government on a high percentage.
And what is these dislikes?
What are they about?
are these people's grievances in your residence and in that area Genetic?
I don't know how you...
I've lived in Alberta for half my life.
Which means a long time.
And I've seen this us versus them thing grow, East versus West.
I spend too much time on social media.
But the feeling...
Smarter minds than me have tried to figure it out.
I really don't understand the great dislike for the federal government.
So there was, I don't know if you got the opportunity to watch, did you watch the testimony of Miss Tamara Litch in this proceeding because it was played out on TV?
I saw some of it.
Do you remember when she said that a lot of Albertans feel that they don't have a voice because the elections that are in?
Resulting in the elections of MP and the federal executive are determined before they even vote and that they just don't feel represented in Ottawa.
Do you remember hearing that?
Yeah, I think I heard that, Joe.
Is that a general grievance that you've heard some of your constituents and that you've heard some of rural Albertans and other Albertans talk about?
I believe so.
Mr. Motts would...
Would probably disagree with the part that they're not represented because he has represented us very well from that area.
But I think the...
Just talking about...
That is a problem that anybody that has studied politics or government will agree with.
The fact that...
You've got a mass of population concentrated in the East and you don't have in the West.
And if you do just by votes, it's very difficult to feel like you're swaying anything when all of the election returns come in.
And by the time you're voting, it's already been decided.
So I can understand that.
Are you aware that with respect to the protests in Ottawa, it's been reported that Albertans made up the Essentially, almost half of the individuals that were here.
I wasn't aware of that, but it doesn't surprise me.
Thank you.
Yep.
Okay, next is the Democracy Fund, JCCF.
Yes.
Good morning, Commissioner.
Good morning, Mayor.
Good morning.
My name is Alan Honor.
I'm a lawyer at the Democracy Fund.
We share status with the JCCF and with Citizens for Freedom.
Mayor, I think you gave evidence earlier today that Coutts is the only 24-hour border crossing in Alberta.
Did I understand that right?
That's correct.
Okay, and about 75 kilometres away from Coutts, there's another border crossing at Del Bonita?
Yes.
And do you know if the border crossing times at Del Bonita were extended during the times of the Coutts protest?
Yes, they were, I believe.
Can you tell us a little bit more about that?
The hours of the days they were extended?
Oh, I can't give you that without it in front of me, but I don't believe it ever went 24 hours.
I know that it was increased considerably, I believe.
I read a number somewhere that percentage-wise they saw crossings go up 917% or something like that.
So it would have had to have been open a lot more, but I don't have the numbers.
That's fair.
Thank you.
I'm wondering, before the protesters left on the 15th and before the Let me actually rephrase this.
After the Emergencies Act was invoked, did you speak to any of the protesters before they left?
Not directly, no.
But you told us about rumors on social media which referred to bank accounts being frozen.
Were those social media accounts coming from the protesters?
Yes.
And how do you know that?
Well, okay, I'm not going to say 100% somebody could have been faking it, but there were Facebook pages called Coutts Convoy, Coutts Convoy Restart.
I'm not going to name them all, but they were obviously followers.
Or participants of the protest by the content that was posted by things that they said.
So these were social media sites where you could sign up and you could make posts regardless of whether or not you were at the protest?
That's correct.
So anybody could have posted those rumors on that site?
Anybody could.
They were moderated sites.
They would have to get past the administrator, but I don't know.
I didn't put them up there.
Okay.
Whatever the case is, however, you would agree with me that the reason why the protesters ultimately leave what you call the straw that broke the camel's back was the discovery of the weapons, and it was not the rumors about the Emergencies Act.
I think that's correct.
I saw an interview with Alex Van Herc that he did the evening of the 14th.
It's on YouTube.
Where he explicitly said that it was the weapons.
It wasn't the act because they'd heard about it, but they were prepared to stay until it.
You know, that's in Ottawa, basically, is what his sympathies were.
And Alex Van Herc was one of the spokespeople or one of the leading people at Coutts among the protesters.
That's correct.
He's been charged along with Marco, so I'm not sure how much I'm supposed to talk about it.
We'll move on.
My friend from the Government of Canada brought up the Critical Infrastructure Defence Act, and I understand you thought that the RCMP should have used that act against the protesters.
I did.
Part of that might have been my misunderstanding of what they were doing.
As I said, I wasn't privy to...
The situation reports that were coming out every day until I saw them the other night.
So there was stuff going on and there possibly are even charges still waiting for people over that act.
Yeah, go ahead.
I'm sorry to interrupt.
I think maybe what...
Would you agree with me that the RCMP may have exercised their jurisdiction under that act or their discretion under that act had the protest not ended when it did?
Well, I think they were doing it even as, like, I know that there were violation tickets and so on being issued and that there possibly are still charges coming.
So the process, Maybe doesn't move as quickly as I would like it to, but I believe they were working under that Act, yes.
Okay, and I just want to ask you about that Act.
Is it your understanding that the Act prohibits the willful obstruction of essential infrastructure if that obstruction renders the infrastructure dangerous, useless, inoperative, or ineffective?
Yes.
Okay.
And in your view, that was happening in Coots because of the blockade?
Yes.
And if somebody commits an offense under that act, the police can arrest that person without a warrant.
Is that right?
I'm not sure about the without a warrant, but I know they can arrest him.
You would take it from me that the act says that?
Sure.
There are also fines under the act?
Yes.
And does it accord with your understanding that the fine for a first offence can be no less than $1,000 and can be as much as $10,000?
I've heard that, yes.
And that a fine for a second offence or a third offence can be as high as $25,000?
Sure.
Do you know if any of the protesters at Coutts were driving company vehicles?
Parking company vehicles?
I don't know for sure.
There might have been some owner operators there.
I didn't see any name brand company vehicles parked there.
But some of those trucks could have been owned by corporations.
It's possible.
And it's also under the Critical Infrastructure Defense Act, someone can be fined, a corporation can be fined a minimum of $10,000 for an offense and a maximum of $200.
I may have seen those numbers.
I don't know.
I'll take your word for it.
Okay, thank you very much.
Those are my questions.
Okay, thank you.
Mayor Willett, do you want to add anything?
We're done the cross-examinations.
I'm just going to ask for whether there's any re-examination by the Commission Council.
So I'll let the re-examination go and then I'll give you a chance to add anything if you'd like.
I just have two brief questions for you.
Just to clarify a point.
When you were talking about your discussion with Mr. Evans about the arrests on the 14th, I think you kind of trailed off a bit under your breath and said something about that the weapons were all fake, something like that.
Is that something Mr. Evans told you?
I believe he mentioned that there was a rumor they had been planted.
Even at that early date.
And then I know that that YouTube video I saw of Mr. Van Herc where he also said he didn't believe that they were real, but they were going to...
That was what was being said, so it was what happened.
Yeah, to answer your question, that's what was said.
I just wanted to confirm that was not your own assessment of the situation.
It was not my assessment, no.
Thank you.
Okay, so that's it.
Do you want to add anything before you head back west?
It's cold out there.
How long can I talk?
No, the situation that happened there, there were a lot of people that said that I was against the protest.
And I wanted to make it perfectly clear I was never against the protest.
You have that freedom, that right to protest anytime you want.
As long as you don't break the law and interfere with my right to travel and so on.
I mean, in a way, I participated in their protest because along with the other border mayors, we communicated with the federal government saying this is not right.
To treat these guys after the two years as if they suddenly become pariahs or something.
So the biggest problem that I had and I still have understanding blocking that highway was who you thought you were damaging.
We're damaging your neighbors.
I had stock movers who couldn't move cattle because it was blocked.
That's a whole part of a chain.
People grow their stock.
They plan for a particular date to deliver it to the feedlot.
So they've got feed for X number of days.
Now that's backed up.
Now they've got to try and find feed.
Well, gee, the feed comes from the other side of the border.
They didn't take into consideration the fact that, yes, they made a big splash, but they were hurting the very people that they figured they were helping by getting the mandates off.
We're a very agricultural area.
I mentioned that I'm the chair of a regional economic development initiative.
Our whole emphasis is on helping to establish that Canada trade corridor and the food corridor with all of the potatoes and sugar beets and pulses and all of those products.
That's our main emphasis.
And when you cut...
You stand there with your foot on my throat and say, you're not going to go through here anymore.
And what you're doing is you're actually choking the livelihood of all your friends and neighbors.
And even if they sympathize with you when they go to the grocery store and there's no fresh produce there because it's on the other side of the border, it's something to consider.
So that was the main thing.
When the protests turned to an illegal blockade, they lost my support.
And that's it.
And I did what I did as far as the village goes because I'm responsible for those people.
And I'll try and get through without breaking down here this time.
but there were people.
It was literally, people were literally physically frozen and not able to go through that blockade.
And since everything is on the other side, it was a tough situation.
But we're not here to argue about that anyway.
The feeling that I got to be truthful is, which I have to be right, is that the federal action had very little to do with the resolution of the blockade there.
I think it was the police action, the finding of the...
It's an undesirable element.
I know that happened.
I've talked to neighbors who saw the actual police action that night.
It wasn't carrying in weapons and planting them.
It was a raid with SWAT-type vehicles.
We had a field hospital set up at the fire hall and that kind of thing.
So it was very serious.
very serious situation.
So, uh, uh, And one last thing, I'm very complimentary of the police.
The RCMP handled themselves very well.
And I'm glad it's over.
And I thank you for that opportunity.
Well, that's fine.
We're here to get at the bottom of what happened, not only in Coutts, but across.
Can I just ask you one thing following up on your all-in-favour-of-protests?
You mentioned about the land that had been set up to continue protesting, and it wasn't used until after the...
The blockade was cleared.
Did I hear you correctly?
Yes.
And they continued to protest there for some time, you said?
Weeks.
Yeah, I don't know the exact number.
And do you know if it was the same group that had blockaded that continued to protest there?
I believe that most of that was people who had showed up for the secondary encampment and they just moved off the road because they had nowhere else Okay, well, thank you very much for coming.
It's appreciated.
Your evidence was appreciated.
You're free to go back to the cold.
Well, thanks, I think.
Okay, so we're going to take the morning adjournment, the morning break, and come back with a new witness.
So we'll take 15 minutes.
The Commission is in recess for 15 minutes.
La Comisión le ve por 15 minutos.
Order alert.
The Commission has reconvened.
Commission on a plan.
Bonjour Monsieur le Commissaire.
I'd like to call Mario Di Tommaso.
Can you stand, please?
Mr. Di Tommaso, will you swear on a religious document or do you wish to affirm?
I would like to swear, please.
We have the Bible, the Quran, or the Torah available?
the bible For the record, please state your full name and spell it out.
Mario Di Tommaso.
Do you swear that the evidence to be given by you to this commission shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
So help you go out.
I so swear.
Thank you.
Orwell, Adr?
The Commissioners.
Thank you.
Good afternoon and thank you for adjusting our schedule.
That's very accommodating.
I understand a witness is willing to go ahead today out of order.
It's Mr. Freeman, I think, and Council Reddy.
Thanks.
Mr. Commissioner Jean Smoltz-Hernholtz for the Commission and as you said, our next witness is Mr. Ian Freeman.
Okay.
Mr. Freeman, will you swear on a religious document or do you wish to affirm?
Bible is fine.
So if you can please stand by the microphone to start by the intro.
Thank you.
For the record, please state your full name and spell it out.
Ian Freeman, I-A-N-F-R-E-E-M-A-N.
Do you swear that the evidence to be given by you to this commission shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?
I do.
Thank you.
Hi, Mr. Freeman.
How are you?
I'm good.
Thank you.
Good to see you again.
So, Mr. Freeman, you sat down with Commissioned Counsel, I believe, last month for an interview.
You recall that?
I do.
So, let's pull up WTS6021.
We've prepared a summary of that interview, and you've had a chance to review it with your counsel?
I have.
Do you have any changes to make to the summary?
There is one change I'd like to make.
Okay.
It's towards the end.
There's a reference to tow trucks that were supplied or coordinated to...
I believe it says we supplied 10 to the City of Ottawa.
Okay.
Oh, sorry.
10 to the City of...
We could scroll down to try and find that.
Very close to the end.
Very close to the end.
I think you can keep going.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Keep going.
Yes, so it says here in this paragraph that's at the bottom of the page, Mr. Freeman's understanding is that MTO sourced some heavy tow trucks for Ottawa and up to 10 tow trucks for Windsor.
It's actually 10 for Ottawa.
For Windsor, we provided a name, a contact name for a tow truck to the OPP, but I don't believe they used that tow truck operator.
Great.
Thank you.
Any other changes?
No.
Wonderful.
So we'll have that entered into evidence.
So, Mr. Freeman, could you start by telling us your current position?
Currently, I'm the Assistant Deputy Minister of the Corporate Services Division at the Ministry of Transportation.
Which is also the Chief Administrative Officer.
And I understand that wasn't your position during the events of January and February earlier this year.
Yeah, that's correct.
At the time, I was the Assistant Deputy Minister of the Policy and Planning Division at MTO.
And can you tell us briefly what your responsibilities are and were at the time?
Yeah, so as the Assistant Deputy Minister in Policy and Planning, I was responsible for developing long-term transportation plans.
We had a unit that was responsible for intergovernmental relations, as well as other policy coordination type activities.
Okay.
And what generally is the MTO's mandate?
Well, MTO's mandate is to provide safety for the transportation network to do Operating of the provincial highway system to provide long-term transportation planning for Ontario's transportation system and, you know, other safety and operational activities related to the transportation system.
And your role within that is the lead on policy development?
That's right.
And who do you report to?
I report to the Deputy Minister of Transportation.
And who was the Deputy Minister at the time?
It was Deputy Minister Laurie LeBlanc at the start.
About halfway through the protest period in mid-February, the Deputy Minister retired and we had a new Deputy Minister, Doug Jones.
There was a very brief period where an associate took over for a few days.
And how many other assistant deputy ministers are there?
There are six other assistant deputy ministers.
Okay.
Do you regularly have direct contact with the Minister of Transport?
Not daily, but regular.
Probably...
Weekly, sometimes less or more, depending on the circumstance and what's happening.
And what kind of contact you have had with her during these events?
During the events, we had occasional briefings with her to give her updates on what was happening operationally and the support that the Ministry was providing, as well as discussions on what else could the Ministry do from a regulatory or policy perspective.
And what role did the minister have in responding to these events?
I don't know that the minister had a direct role in responding to the events.
The government's response, the Government of Ontario's response, was being coordinated through...
The solicitor, Minister of the Solicitor General.
So she would have certainly had a role in terms of the mandate that I spoke to at the beginning, that she would exercise that, but I don't think she had a specific role in regards to these protests.
Thanks.
Can you tell us generally what acts and regulations MTO is responsible for enforcing?
The main act would be the Highway Traffic Act.
I think there's quite a few other acts that we also enforce or have responsibility for, but our key act is the Highway Traffic Act.
And am I correct that both police...
As well as MTO officers can enforce the provisions of the Highway Traffic Act?
That's correct.
I don't know if our enforcement officers enforce all aspects of the Highway Traffic Act.
I think there are certain elements of that that they do, among other legislation as well.
So in some cases, MTO officers could enforce independently.
In others, they would require enforcement by...
By police.
Correct.
Okay, I'd like to go to ONT50447.
So this is an email dated January 21st.
From Jessica Barton, who I understand is at the MTO.
And if we go to the second paragraph, it says, the convoy is expected to start in some areas of Ontario on January 25th, ending travel to Ottawa January 29th at noon.
Primarily, it will be bobtail trucks, but may also include four-wheel vehicles and trailers as well.
Currently, there's no estimated number of trucks.
However, it is expected to be in the thousands into Ottawa.
Did you receive this briefing?
If you go up, you can see the recipient list of this email.
No, I wouldn't be part of that distribution list.
Was this information that was generally available to you at this time on the 21st?
No, no.
This is our enforcement branch that this is being referred to as our transportation enforcement branch.
I wouldn't have any dealings with them.
For this issue at this time.
And so can you maybe just tell us who the ADM for that branch was at the time?
That would have been the ADM of our Transportation Safety Division, which was Shelley Unterlander.
Okay, thank you.
Can you tell us, do you have information on what MTO did at this time upon receiving this type of information in anticipation of the events?
My understanding is the Transportation Safety Division developed an operational plan, which would be normal course of action for them to do.
Which would speak to what the officers, you know, what's the flow of information, what their anticipated role might be, kind of rules of engagements for officers.
I would also imagine, although I don't have direct knowledge of it, that our operations division would also connect with police through...
Likely the OPP to see if there was any sort of information that might be needed from highway operations.
So, for example, changeable message signs, any support that might be needed for police.
But I don't have specific knowledge as to what activities they took at this time.
But those would typically be the types of actions that would happen for an event such as this.
And if we can go to ONT405150, I just want you to confirm I believe this is a copy of that plan that you just mentioned that was developed.
Is that the plan you mentioned?
Yes, this would be it.
Okay.
And again, the purpose of that plan was to kind of anticipate what type of actions MTO officers would be required to take as part of this event.
That's right.
And do you know what was anticipated at that time for possible actions they would take?
Well, from my review of the document previously, they were expecting a peaceful protest.
And they would not be directly engaging with the protest, but that they would be available if police needed assistance with any sort of expertise around commercial truck inspections and that type of work.
Okay.
So, have you had a chance to review Ontario's institutional report?
Yes.
It's been provided?
Yes.
So, we don't necessarily need to pull that up, but it states that on February 4th, MTO officers began supporting the OPP with issues arising from the planned protest at Queen's Park in Toronto.
Do you recall that?
I do.
And I guess what support was being provided?
My understanding was there wasn't any direct support that was needed.
The officers were patrolling the GTA highways to be visible, but they weren't directly engaging in the protest activities.
And would engagement have been only subject to a request by OPP?
Yes.
And that request in COM, I take it?
That's my understanding.
And the request for that support for that visibility in Toronto around that time, that would have been on OPP's request?
Yes.
Do you know whether there was any requests?
By either OPP or OPS for a similar kind of presence in Ottawa ahead of the arrival of the convoy in Ottawa?
I'm not aware of a request for that.
Just to provide us with some context, how many MTO officers are there in the province?
There's approximately 150.
And I take it that the MTO is able to deploy those to different areas as necessary?
It can be done.
It's not typical.
Typical, they will operate out of specific regions and locations, but if needed, they can be.
Okay.
Do you know if that was done in the present case, redeployment?
That's my understanding, is that officers were redeployed to Ottawa at the request of the OPP, you know, towards the back end of the protest.
Okay.
Okay.
In the institutional report, it states that on February 4th, there was a meeting between the MTO, Transport Canada, and others to discuss certain measures that might be available.
If we can pull up ONT402759.
If we can just go down to the next email.
Yes, so this is an email that you sent, I understand, with the summary of the calls.
I understand there was a first call on a fourth and then a follow-up on the fifth.
Is that correct?
That's right.
And this is your summary of those calls?
The one that's showing here is my summary of the February 5th call.
I'm not sure if further down it summarizes the fourth.
Okay.
I want to touch on a couple points in this email.
The point that starts by number one, it says...
Well, I guess I'll start just above that.
They, being Transport Canada, correct?
Yes.
Are looking for the following.
And then you asked for a response to this.
You say, point one, can we provide the impacts of any charges that could be laid to truck drivers, operators?
For example, types of charges that lead to CVOR points.
What are potential impacts of that?
Insurance, sanctions, contracts.
Are there other potential non-CVOR impacts?
So what was the inquiry here from Transport Canada?
What were they looking for?
Transport Canada was interested in understanding if police laid charges or even if there was the threat of laying charges.
Charges, what would be the impact to commercial?
as an example, that might be a good one.
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you you you you you you you you you you you you you If we can just go up to the top of this email, just right
up to the top.
I don't know who he's sending to.
I'm assuming he's sending it to all of the entire MTO enforcement officer group.
So I think it's information sharing.
So knowing that this is what's happening and to make sure officers are aware of what their responsibilities are.
So it's effectively to brief officers on what the agreement is between OPP and MTO.
Yeah.
Okay.
And I know they ultimately updated the operational plans, et cetera, to...
To accommodate this, but I suspect this was the, you know, having just been informed and agreed to, that's what they were doing.
They were making sure officers were aware as quick as possible.
Okay.
let's go to ont uh five zeros four six one If we can scroll down, I think there's a portion involved.
This is, sorry, before we go down.
So this is an enforcement directive.
So is this a directive that would have been issued to all enforcement officers?
Yes.
Okay.
So this is February 9th.
If we can go down, there's a section in bold there.
It says there, officers are not to engage in enforcement activities with individuals or vehicles participating with the convoy for freedom or related protest activities.
What specifically was this meant to address?
This is basically...
Making sure that officers understand that they're there in a supporting role for police based on, it's probably outlined in here as well, but similar to what you would have saw in the exhibit we just had, which was speaking to their role of helping with inspections,
providing expertise, that type of role, versus making sure that they know they're not out there handing out tickets or And was this direction coming on request to the OPP, or was this a decision from MTO not to have officers conduct enforcement themselves?
I don't know where it came from, but it would be...
It rings true as to the way that this type of...
The approach to this type of activity is...
When there's a police-led initiative, police are there to do enforcement.
We provide support and expertise within our mandate.
But again, our officers are not armed.
They don't have firearms and things like that, so they would not provide that type of support.
Thank you.
So I'd like to go to ONT50156.
This is a February 8th letter from Deputy Minister LeBlanc to Deputy Minister Michael Keenan of Transport Canada.
You're familiar with this letter, correct?
Yes.
Were you involved in discussions around the drafting of this letter?
Yes.
Okay.
And can you maybe explain what the purpose generally of this letter was?
What was it in response to?
I think it was twofold.
There had been a lot of discussions that we had had back and forth between the Ministry of Transportation and Transport Canada, where we had committed to following up, and we wanted to make sure that our position was formally responded to.
But I also think, you know, there...
There was many discussions where the federal government or municipalities had made suggestions that, you know, why don't you just cancel CVOR as an example?
Like, you know, why can't you use these types of powers?
And we were trying to...
Just make it clear that we've looked into this and it's not possible.
So we just wanted to make sure we went on record by describing what we felt we could and couldn't do so that there was no kind of ambiguity to it.
And the other piece was just to make sure the roles and responsibilities within the Ontario government was made clear that...
Solgen, the Ministry of Solicitor General, was the coordinating ministry body, and MTO was there to assist.
Okay.
If we could go to the third paragraph in this letter.
It says, starting at the second sentence.
The Ministry of Transportation stands ready to provide support as needed to law enforcement in areas where the Ministry is well-placed to help, and we have been working closely with the Ministry of the Solicitor General, including the OPP, to assist where possible.
This includes providing traffic management support, such as messaging signs and barriers, to support traffic rerouting caused by the protests and rigorously enforcing any convictions resulting from the protests.
It also includes providing commercial vehicle enforcement support in ways that support the Ministry's road safety mandate at the request of police.
Ontario's response is being coordinated through the Ministry of the Solicitor General, and all requests should be directed through them.
So, was the federal government to understand then that all requests for MTO enforcement assistance were to come through police?
And to be communicated through the Solicitor General's office?
Requests from the federal government to the Ontario government?
Yeah, we were requesting that that go through the Solicitor General.
Ministry of the Solicitor General.
Sorry, not the Solicitor General.
And so was the response here effectively...
Communicating to the federal government that they were asking MTO to go beyond their enforcement capabilities?
No, I don't think that was the intent so much as, you know, in this part of the week, the first half of the week of the, you know, started on, I guess, you know, from the 4th to the...
Eighth or ninth when this was sent.
There was a lot of reach out between different parties trying to get their arms around what's possible, what's not possible.
And I think in Ontario, we were trying to put some order to our response so that we could be coordinated.
You know, most effectively support the operations.
So I don't think it was meant to be anything more than that, was to just try and put in a chain of commands, probably not the right language, but, you know, a proper communication flow so that we could make sure that, as an Ontario government, we were all working together.
To support as best as possible.
But it wasn't to suggest that anybody was overreaching or certainly wasn't to try and be unhelpful in any way.
It was trying to help us be organized in our response.
And this last paragraph here on page one, however, I want to clarify some potential misunderstanding on the applicability of driver's licenses and commercial vehicle operator permissions.
I won't read the full paragraph, but essentially was the clarification here along the lines of what you've already provided on CVORs?
Yes.
Was the federal government asking MTO to apply sanctions under that regime without convictions?
The...
I don't know if it was ever a direct ask, but it was certainly questions or comments that suggested we should be using all powers within our toolkit, including cancellations of CVORs.
I don't think they were suggesting that go against what...
Is allowed by the Highway Traffic Act or going against procedures, but they also didn't understand all of the procedures.
So I think it was them trying to understand and in a very, you know, narrow review of the legislation, it could be interpreted that you could just do that.
And we were trying to explain that the application of the legislation doesn't practically do that.
We'll see later that there were warning letters issued after the provincial state of emergency was declared of potential CVOR consequences under that law.
Could that have been done prior to the invocation of the provincial emergency to send warning letters about known potential violations?
I think… We were never asked by police to do it, and it was a police-led response, so I would clarify that first.
But I would also say I think we would be of the opinion that, you know, sending warning letters for something that we know we wouldn't deploy wouldn't be the right thing to do.
Okay.
And was that type of measure ever contemplated or discussed as far as you know?
Certainly, there was lots of discussions about what we could and couldn't do, including notifying commercial vehicle operators that their trucks were there.
We looked at all sorts of different things that could be considered.
I don't know whether this was specifically discussed.
If we could go to pb.can.50810.
And we'll go to page four once you open that up.
So our understanding is that OPS had identified potential violations of the Transportation and Dangerous Goods Act.
Go to page four and down to that background section, please.
And you'll see here in this third paragraph, the Ottawa Police are seeking the assistance of TDG, which I understand to be Transportation of Dangerous Good Inspectors, to participate in joint police and MTO operations to provide subject matter expertise to confirm violations under the Act and regulations.
Are you aware of these joint...
These joint operations?
No.
No.
And so, does MTO play a role in enforcing this Transportation of Dangerous Goods Act?
We do.
The transportation enforcement officers are trained in transportation of dangerous goods legislation.
And are you aware of whether MTO officers engaged in any enforcement of that act during these events?
I'm not aware.
It doesn't mean it didn't happen.
I'm just not specifically aware of whether or not the officers...
That was part of their mandate that was given.
If asked by police to do that, I do not know if they actually did it.
Okay.
Thank you.
If we could go to ONT50111.
So this is a February 9th.
I think it's an email.
If we could go down.
Right.
So my understanding is in this email chain, there was a question of whether...
OPP would be collecting CVOR information in Windsor.
And MTO was advised that most vehicles in Windsor were not commercial vehicles.
Was that your understanding?
Yes.
Okay.
And that was different than in Ottawa, I take it?
I actually don't know how many vehicles there were in Ottawa and whether most or not.
There are certainly a large number of commercial motor vehicles in Ottawa.
That we know, but in terms of whether it was most, I actually don't know.
Do you know whether MTO received CVOR information on vehicles in Ottawa?
We did, but only at the time when we were asked to exercise suspensions as part of the emergency orders.
Okay, at the tail end of the protest.
And is that something that was done on request of police?
Yes.
MTO was provided with that information?
Yes.
Thank you.
If we can go to ssm.can.50374, and we'll go to page 3. So these are internal emails at Transport Canada on February 10th.
Just want to get your comments on their content.
Oh, up to where it starts.
Sorry, page three, and the paragraph that starts with third.
Okay.
So it says, authority to manage international crossings.
And then it says, but this purposefully confuses authorities between governments.
Was the MTO of the view that the federal government had the authority, or that Transport Canada, maybe more specifically, could act on its own to enforce with respect to the Windsor blockade because of authority on international crossings?
Not in the discussions that I was part of.
There may have been discussions around where the authority lies, specifically of...
But, you know, at an operational level, we were supporting the Windsor Police and the Ontario Provincial Police.
So, you know, it wasn't part of the discussions I was having as to who had the authority.
And if we go to this paragraph, the Bridges and Tunnels Act has some authorities, but they do not directly bring any authorities to bear on the blockade.
And then it talks about how the protest here is not on the bridge itself, but is on the road in front of the bridge.
Would you agree that as the blockade was not on the bridge itself, the Transport Canada did not have enforcement authority?
I'm I'm I'm not an expert in that, but that would be my sense, and that seemed to be the way it was playing out, is that Windsor Police were leading the response to this with the help of the OPP and perhaps RCMP.
I'm not sure whether they were involved or not because we weren't directly involved in the police operations, but that's consistent with...
My understanding from a layman's point of view is of what seemed to be happening.
So I take it from what you're saying then that you're not aware of the provincial government purposefully confusing authorities between governments?
No.
Okay.
It continues if we go down.
Paragraph starting.
Yeah, we can further suggest.
Quietly to Ontario, truly wants us to invoke federal authority to manage this crisis.
They need to declare an emergency they cannot manage, so we can thereby invoke the Federal Emergencies Act to manage the blockades, i.e.
turn their request to use federal authority into a poison pill based on the fundamental reality of legal authorities.
So it seemed that federal officials are suggesting that Ontario is trying to force the federal government to use its own authorities.
Are you aware of any authority other than the Emergencies Act that would have been available to Transport Canada to respond to the blockade in Windsor?
I'm not.
And like this type of...
kind of discussion that was happening, I wasn't part of.
February 11th, in the institutional report, it states that the City of Ottawa requested MTO inspectors to perform inspection and enforcement duties in and around Ottawa, and that MTO approved that request.
And provided officers.
I understand from one of the documents that the city was requesting for MTO officers.
You recall that?
Sorry, is there a document?
yeah we can we can go to ont50463 And we'll go to the third page.
We can go down.
Oh, sorry, right at the top there.
Ottawa City requesting our four officers.
Yeah.
Yeah, I'm aware of this.
And it says here, they would like visible enforcement, fly the flag and show a force on the roads as their enforcement capacities have been limited and they want to instill public confidence, essentially mini blitz.
And so...
Was the request essentially just to be a show of force in the City of Ottawa, but not necessarily one that would lead to actual enforcement?
So my understanding of this one was it wasn't directly related to the convoy protesters.
We were asked to provide some commercial motor vehicle enforcement, a blitz, that was not addressing...
People participating in the protest, but rather focusing on other commercial motor vehicles that were around because I think from reading this, and I don't know the City of Ottawa's motivation specifically, but from reading this was that they wanted to make sure that the public knew we were also doing regular truck inspections as well.
And my understanding is they did.
Do some additional truck inspections on that weekend.
Thank you.
We heard from City of Ottawa General Manager of Emergency Services, Kim Ayut, in his witness statement that the City had inquired with MTO about towing capacity and that he understood that MTO was unable to assist.
I take it from the evidence you've provided today that ultimately MTO was able to assist, but that wasn't provided directly to the city, is that?
That's correct.
that was provided to the OPP.
The Mayor of Ottawa testified that there were some discussions between the city and MTO regarding the potential of leveraging insurance to end the protests.
and that the MTO was reluctant to explore this idea further.
Can you maybe explain the specific issue of insurance?
I don't have much to offer on that, unfortunately.
MTO doesn't regulate insurance.
I believe it's the Ministry of Finance that does that.
I don't believe we've had...
To our knowledge or to my knowledge, certainly, that there was any powers that the Ministry of Transportation has or even perhaps the province to do anything specific with insurance.
Certainly not the ministry and not to my knowledge.
Might penalties and demerit points under the CVR, might those have an impact on insurance?
Yes, yes.
So, yeah, for sure.
So, if you, you know, as you...
Collect demerit points on your license, your insurance often goes up.
And the same is with a CVOR program that, you know, over time, if you have a worse safety record, you may have insurance impacts from that.
What you're saying here is that the MTO could not have imposed some kind of suspension on insurance or something like that of its own enforcement power.
Right.
Thank you.
We'll pull up COM50910.
This is Ontario's emergency regulations that were adopted after the provincial state of emergency was declared.
So you can reference it as necessary.
But what was your understanding of what additional powers the emergency declaration and the regulations provided to MTO?
And to the Registrar of Motor Vehicles.
So, largely, the first I would say is there was a direct nexus between blocking or impeding critical infrastructure, as is identified here, to the ability for the Deputy Registrar to suspend.
Licenses, driver's licenses, vehicle plates, and CVORs.
That was the most substantive change for the registrar, so for MTO to be able to implement.
And of course, it also gave police other powers in terms of directing people to leave the area and other penalties.
So is your understanding then that it provided...
MTO and the Registrar Motor Vehicles the power to do what was being requested prior but couldn't be done?
That's correct.
Okay.
If we can go down to Section 3. So here it says, no person shall impede access to or egress from or the ordinary use of any highway, walkway, or bridge where such impediment has the effect of Preventing the delivery of essential goods or services, severely disrupting ordinary economic activity, or causing serious interference with the safety, health, or well-being of members of the public.
Do you know whether MTO or the provincial government had formed an opinion on whether that would apply to the vehicles parked on the streets of Ottawa?
Whether they would be causing You know, A, B, or C?
My feeling is that this was intended to capture a situation like Ottawa and was used by police in Ottawa.
So I believe the answer that would be yes.
Thank you.
And do you know whether either the MTO or the registrar used any of the powers?
And I believe if we go down, it's...
Keep going down.
So the power at Section 5 to order the owner-operator to remove a vehicle.
And then I think it's section six is to impose penalties.
Do you know if those powers were used by MTO or the registrar?
They were.
Not five.
I think police used five.
But the registrar did, through the deputy registrar, use the powers of number six.
Okay.
Do you know when those powers were used?
It was...
At the time that the protests were being cleared in Ottawa, I want to say February 19th and 20th and maybe 21st.
So at the tail end during the enforcement action?
Yes.
Thank you.
I see a request on, this is in the Institutional Report on February 12th.
By the OPP to the MTO to supply concrete barriers.
Is that a type of assistance that MTO would normally provide to OPP?
It could be if there was a need to have some sort of highway barrier for an extended period of time.
And I take it MTO responded to that request positively?
We did.
I saw in an email on this topic, I can pull it up if need be, but that there was difficulty with certain contractors in providing those barriers.
Are you aware of that?
Yeah.
It was a similar situation as to what we were having with the tow trucks, that contractors were worried about the implications of helping.
So it took a...
You know, they had to go through several to find one that would be able to supply.
Ministry of Transportation doesn't have our own source of contract barriers.
So we had to use, or sorry, the barriers, the concrete barriers.
So we had to use contractors.
Thank you.
If we could pull up ONT.
6081.
So this, I believe, is a February 15th email with respect to the Federal Provincial Territorial Crime Prevention and Policing Committee, and it's on this topic of Transport Canada's Strategic Enforcement Strategy.
If we can go down.
So I believe this is an email where MTO provided some comments on Transport Canada's draft strategic enforcement strategy.
What was your understanding of that strategy?
My understanding of the strategy was that Transport Canada wanted to give a playbook for the federal government, the provincial government, and...
Police to be able to use consistent messaging and consistent approaches to how enforcement could be deployed in response to the protests.
And I understand MTO had some revisions, some proposed amendments to this strategy.
Do you know what the nature of those?
What were MTO's concerns?
So, I mean, this would be pretty normal.
There's a good cooperation, generally, between the federal government and the province.
So, as they're developing documents, they'll send out drafts and we provide our input.
In this case, it was generally to try and make sure that we tried to make fact-based edits to their document.
I don't believe it's in here, but I do know in meetings we suggested that this type of document should go through again through the Ministry of Solicitor General.
Okay.
Do you know whether the strategic enforcement strategy was finalized and whether those comments were integrated?
I don't remember seeing a final.
A final version of this.
And do you know why that is?
I don't.
So do you know whether it was ever implemented then?
I don't.
It states that at the request of the OPP MTO secured heavy tow trucks to support police efforts in Ottawa.
Those are the 10 tow trucks we've referred to.
Yep.
Did the provincial declaration of emergency assist at all with that?
I don't.
I don't.
Believe so.
I don't believe so.
If we could pull up ONT 975.
We could go down to the second email there.
This is a February 17th email.
I wanted to share, as FYI, a request we received from OPP to confirm access to driver photos in response to the trucker protest.
As you may know, MTO currently has strict guidelines for the use of MTO photos by officers.
However, police can access under extreme circumstances.
Police indicated they will be using these photos to help in criminal investigations regarding identifying offenders.
Are you familiar with this request?
I am.
It's not an area of the ministry I've ever had any direct involvement in, but I can do my best to give you some context.
I guess the question is, is this the type of request that...
I understand in extreme circumstances that would be done in other circumstances.
It didn't require any emergency legislation provincially or federally?
No, no.
Essentially, my understanding of this is it's to allow police to...
They already have access to driver's license photos.
This allows them to reproduce the photos if they need to.
And it's commonly used for investigative purposes or...
Could even be used for, you know, an Amber Alert or something like that where they wanted access to a picture or something like that.
So those would be the type of exceptional circumstances.
Okay.
If we go to...
I understand an operations plan for Ministry Officers was...
Adopted to assist with the enforcement action in Ottawa at the tail end of the protests.
You're familiar with that?
Yes.
Can you just briefly explain the purpose of that plan?
So my understanding was this just brought a little bit more specificity to their role to support the clearing of the protests.
They had some additional duties where they were going to be working at the areas where tow trucks might be removing vehicles and where they might be taking them for storage.
Okay, so their additional duties would be involved in the removal of vehicles and bringing them to storage?
No, sorry, just to clarify.
So they did not actually remove vehicles, but just making sure that if the mechanical fitness was sound so that they could be towed.
And then wherever the drop-off point was, just to assist police with that.
And also, if police had any questions on completing...
Any of the forms that they needed to do related to the emergency orders or anything else.
And do you know whether that plan was developed in conjunction with law enforcement?
I don't specifically know, but I would imagine it would have been.
Thank you.
And just for the record, that document is ONT50452.
We don't need to pull that up.
If we could, I just want to pull up briefly, ONT50976.
This is one of the enforcement letters that was issued.
Sorry, one of the warning letters, if we can go down.
Sorry.
So this is the type of enforcement letter.
Were these actually issued?
Yes, there was, I believe the number is around 50 to 60 of these that were issued at the request of police.
And I think there's a reference in document ONT453.
We don't need to go there to this being done at the request of OPP, as you said.
Do you know why this was in relation to authority under the provincial declaration of authority I don't have any insight into the...
police planning around around that.
Lastly I'd just like to go to So I understand that there was a kind of a post-mortem discussion that was held between Transport Canada and the MTO.
Is that right?
Or maybe this is just...
I don't specifically recall one.
So it says here at the top, as mentioned the other day, we reached out to MTO for a post-mortem discussion on the blockades.
This is on March 4th.
Do you remember that?
I don't remember participating in a call.
It's possible I did.
I don't specifically remember the call, though.
Okay.
Do you remember preparation for the call or hearing about it after the fact?
No.
Okay.
So I'll just get your take on some of these takeaways from the call.
It says, here are a few key takeaways.
They are now...
They, being MTO, I understand, are now working through regular regulatory processes with respect to the trucks involved in blockades.
For example, if there were tickets laid that impact CVOR, they will run the course of conviction and then would be reflected on the record.
Can you explain?
Yeah, so that's, as I was talking about before, so if there's a conviction that's related to mechanical fitness or driver behavior that is related to the commercial vehicle operator registration, once conviction happens, it then goes on the CVOR record.
And here it says that they are now working through.
Has there been any change since the events in question here in MTO's approach to those types of convictions?
No.
No.
And then if we just go down a little bit, the third bullet point for out-of-province trucks.
Of which there were many plates were seized and mailed back to the registrar of the home jurisdiction with an explanation letter.
However, there is no mechanism to ensure that there would be an impact on the operator record.
MTO is waiting to hear what the response from those provinces and territories will be.
So my understanding is that that's still an issue, the ability to enforce.
That's right.
Yeah, that's as I described earlier.
And then lastly, if we go down in terms of lessons learned to the second bullet under that, at provincial level, what was lacking for MTO was ability to take immediate action on misconduct aside from temporary powers under the Provincial Emergencies Act.
The system right now only kicks in...
When there are convictions and that's consistent with what you've told me today, correct?
Yes.
Great.
Thank you so much, Mr. Freeman.
Those are my questions.
Thanks.
Okay.
Well, maybe we'll take the afternoon break now for 15 minutes and come back and continue with the examination of the switch.
The Commission is in recess for 15 minutes.
The Commission is in recess for 15 minutes.
The Commission is in recess for 15 minutes.
The Commission is in recess for 15 minutes.
Order allowed.
The Commission is reconvened.
La Commissione rapproche.
Okay.
I think first up is the Government of Canada.
Thank you, Commissioner, and good afternoon, Mr. Freeman.
Aye.
My name is Brendan Van Nienhuis.
I'm one of the lawyers for the Government of Canada in this matter.
could we go please to ont50447 I think we saw this before.
This was a note from Jessica Barton to AllMTO, yes?
No, it's to a particularly, sorry, to the enforcement branch of MTO.
I see, okay.
If we could just look down the page there, just under Good Afternoon, she refers to a planned convoy called the Convoy for Freedom, right?
Yes.
And if we go a little further down the page, I think to the fifth or so paragraph.
There we go.
You see that...
The paragraph, the little short paragraph there with the link highlighted in it, the scheduled dates and routes are planned until you started this website?
Yes.
And the website there is the website called Bearhug Canada Unity, Bearhug 2.0, right?
Yep.
Are you familiar with that being a website operated by Mr. James Bowder?
I'm not.
Okay.
You were yourself paying close attention to the different...
Different factions, so to speak, of convoys coming?
No.
The distinction between the Bearhug Canada Unity Group and the King and Leech Freedom Convoy?
No.
At this point, I wasn't directly involved in this.
I was only following it, what was in the media.
Okay.
Can we go similarly to ONT50973?
And this, too, is a note from Jessica Barton, and this is to Transport Canada, right?
Yes.
And this is sharing information also on January the 21st about the upcoming Convoy for Freedom.
Yes.
If you can just go slightly down the page to that first entry in the table, you see already she has information with respect to a planned protest.
in both windsor and sarnia yes yes and that's planned as what i think is referred to as a slow roll based on the description offered there yes and then moving further down the page to the next table entry you see again reference to the convoy for freedom and the bear hug or canada unity.com website correct yes and so again to the best of your knowledge there wasn't awareness on the part of mto at that time of
There being other convoy groups such as the Freedom Convoy group associated to Mr. Barber, Ms. Leach, etc.
I don't know that I would take from this email that there was an awareness of other groups.
I can't speak to why only this particular website is identified.
So I can't say with certainty the answer to that question.
Fair enough.
Could we go to ONT 405150, please?
And so, do you recognize this, sir, as an operations plan for MTO with respect to the Freedom Convoy?
Yes.
And this is a document that went through various iterations as sort of a living document as things evolved.
Fair?
Yes.
There's multiple versions of this.
We went through some of them, I think.
And this one appears to have been amended up to January the 31st?
Yes.
If we could go to page four of the document, please.
If you look at the bottom of this page, You'll see, if I've got my numbers right, yes, you'll see a list here of truck inspection stations across the province, right?
Yes.
And this is a list that tracks, it's not all of the stations, but this tracks the route of the Convoy for Freedom as I was understood by MTO at that time, right?
I can't say for sure, but without seeing if the document states that, but...
Just looking at these locations, that would seem to be correct.
Okay.
And also just looking at the text above it, which said this plan's been developed.
Right.
Yeah.
That's correct.
Continue on to page five.
Okay.
And just stopping at the first paragraph, again, you see this is a group of commercial vehicle drivers planning a truck protest dubbed the Convoy for Freedom, right?
Yes.
And then in the fourth bullet under background, sorry, the third bullet under background, you'll see that, again, this is associated to the CanadaUnity.com website as opposed to other groups, right?
Right.
Okay.
Is it fair to draw the conclusion that the intelligence or the information available and promulgated by MTO was really being drawn from the CanadaUnity.com website in terms of intended routes and so forth?
It's possible, but I wasn't part of the creation of this document or really involved at this time, so I can't verify that for you for sure.
But this document obviously only refers to that.
If we just look under mission statement a moment, and it carries over the page just to see if it continues.
I can't recall.
It does not.
So if we go back up to mission statement, these are the key.
Mission items that I guess have been compiled by your staff with respect to the operations plan, right?
Yes.
And you see that what's being considered is whether to close TIS facilities if necessitated by protest activities, right?
Yes.
Were you aware at the time that more trucks and convoys were anticipated to be joining the existing Ottawa scenario by that point?
Recalling this is the Monday after the first weekend?
I feel like by the Monday we had a good sense that it was getting bigger than we had initially thought.
And of course we saw earlier you already knew that there were affiliated or sympathetic protest activities that were contemplated or planned.
In the areas of the Ambassador Bridge at Windsor and at Sarnia, correct?
Yes.
And was it consideration given, so far as you're aware, to whether in fact it might have made sense to activate the TIS stations to require inspection of the trucks that were assembling in these locations?
My understanding from talking to the enforcement director is They did have conversations with the OPP and they were asked not to use the truck inspection facilities for this purpose.
Okay.
If we go to page seven, please.
In the second bullet point under enforcement, I see there...
It reads in the last sentence, officers will not be involved in any commercial vehicle traffic stops of vehicles that are participating in the convoy protest unless directed to do so by the site leads, right?
Yep.
And was that similarly at the request of the OPP that your officers from MTO not be involved in such stops?
I can't say that what went into this was at the request of the OPP, but I would say that, you know, as a general...
application of these types of being, you know, protest type activities that MTO would not interfere.
Could we go please to ont.ir.701?
Thank you.
It'll ask to go to page seven when the document's up.
This is the Ontario Institutional Report, Mr. Freeman.
Okay.
And if we go to page 7, to the entry for February the 4th, and that's the entry for 16, sorry, let me actually do the first bullet, a 9.09 a.m. entry.
Do you see that?
Yes.
It indicates that MTO officers began supporting the OPP with issues arising from the planned protest at Queen's Park in Toronto, including blockage of GTI highways, right?
Yes.
And that lasted until Monday, February 6th, correct?
Yes.
That would be the second weekend of the convoy events?
That's correct.
And at that time, similar assistance was not provided by MTO with respect to the scene in Ottawa, correct?
Well, my understanding on that weekend is MTO officers were also providing regular patrols in Ottawa as well.
I believe MTO was also assisting with closing of highways.
I don't know whether it was done through enforcement officers, but I believe that weekend there may have been some highway closures.
I may be wrong in my facts, but I know there was definitely times where MTO assisted with closing of Okay.
Is it fair to say you don't recall when, but you believe that that occurred at some point?
Yes.
If I look at the next entry on February the 4th at 1645, representatives of MTO intended an urgent meeting convened by Transport Canada, correct?
Yes.
Thank you.
And that was to discuss provincial and territorial mitigation measures.
Directed at the Freedom Convoy protests, right?
Yep.
Could we go now, please, to ONT402759?
And just to be clear, you did not attend the February 4th meeting, correct?
Correct.
Can we go to the bottom email, which is at the intersection of pages two and three?
There we go.
You see there's an email here from Aaron at Transport Canada.
Aaron McCrory at Transport Canada to you and others, right?
Yep.
Your provincial and territorial colleagues?
Yep.
And Transport Canada here is again apologizing for the late evening email, but hoping to have a follow-up discussion tomorrow, that is to say Saturday the 5th at 11.30 in the morning, right?
Yes.
And I guess that's central time, so...
12:30 here.
Yes.
And you attended that meeting?
I did.
If you go up page two to see your report onward from the meeting.
There we go.
Just go a little further up, we can see where it starts.
Okay, so let's just see.
You're reporting out to your staff, I believe.
Could we just go to the email header?
Reporting out to your staff, correct?
One was my staff.
Two were assistant deputy minister colleagues.
I see.
Okay, to your colleagues and staff.
And you're reporting on what happened at the meeting from your perspective?
Yes.
If you just go a little down the page there.
You're reporting on what Transport Canada is looking for with respect to three things.
If I may summarize, the impacts of charges that lead to commercial vehicle operator registry points, right?
Yep.
Legislation that protects critical infrastructure and services from disruption, right?
Yep.
And lastly, incentives that might be offered to tow operators or penalties to compel them to provide services, right?
Correct.
And if you go a little further down the page, you say they're hoping for any information we can provide as soon as possible, right?
Yes.
And Transport Canada has called this as an urgent meeting, right?
Yes.
And what you say to your colleagues and staff is, my suggestion is we pull what we can easily do on Monday and send end of day.
Best efforts here.
If something isn't available, I think we can say that, right?
Yes.
So you're saying to your colleagues and staff, essentially, don't work too hard on this.
Don't kill yourself.
We'll deal with it on Monday.
Fair?
No, I don't.
I didn't mean it to say that.
I think people, it's a Saturday, and they would need to engage other people to try and find these things out.
So I was suggesting that we would have something to them by end of day Monday.
can we go to ont403842 This is the February 6th meeting, Mr. Freeman, the Sunday meeting to which I believe you didn't go, but you did send Laurie LeBlanc, right?
She's the Deputy Minister, so I don't send her, just to be clear.
Excuse me, I've got the...
My boss.
Rolls are first.
Go to page six, please.
If we go under where Mr. Keenan is speaking, he's got three bullet points summarized.
And he notes at the last bullet point that the Wellington encampments, let's say the Ottawa occupation, is the spiritual source of the protest movement, right?
Yes.
And it's inspiring, in short, other protest activities that have begun to be seen in locations as far away as Coutts, right?
Yes.
It creates the spiritual fuel that will sustain the actions of the various encampments, right?
Yep.
And if I look at Ms. LeBlanc's response, she's reporting in the third bullet that demerit points relative to the CVORs, I take it, Is a long-term strategy that will not help with the situation in the short term.
Is that fair?
Yes.
And then also that the trucks are from outside province, and that adds a layer of complexity to enforcing on a licensing basis, right?
Yes, that's what.
And if I look at the top bullet, she says that with respect to tow trucks, MTO will just be working with the private sector to see what's out there.
Fair?
Yes.
Now, the next day, February, actually, can we go to the last page of this document?
You see there, the second last speaker noted is Jody Thomas, the National Security Intelligence Advisor.
Yes?
Yes.
And she says she regrets ending on this point, asking, would the province be looking to the federal government if this protest was happening outside of the city of Ottawa?
For example, another place like Kingston, right?
And perhaps this is a question we can ask tomorrow, but...
It appears Deputy Solicitor General Di Tommaso says this is a protest and encampment movement against the federal mandate on trucks.
They came to Ottawa from across the country for that purpose, right?
That's what it says, yeah.
Does that reflect Ontario's attitude at that point towards the Ottawa protest as a federal responsibility?
I don't know if I can speak for all of Ontario.
You know, I was...
Just being brought into this from the federal government at this time to look at options, I don't know that we thought this to be purely a federal problem.
We did.
I do think we understood the movement was against the federal mandate.
But, you know, in our minds, this was...
A policing issue, not necessarily a federal versus provincial issue.
Can we go to SSM.CAN.405289?
I'm showing you a text exchange from your minister.
Minister Al-Gabra of the Federal Minister of Transport, okay?
Are you familiar with these exchanges?
No.
No.
Were you involved in any calls with Minister Mulroney and Minister Al-Gabra?
No.
Okay.
Let me just take a look at them a second and scroll down the page.
It's clear, though, that assuming that's what they are, that this is Minister Al-Gabra asking for a call, right?
Yes.
And February 7th, 3.50 p.m., Minister Mulroney...
Fair to say, does not respond in the sense of scheduling a call, right?
Yep, it sounds like she's waiting for an update.
Yep, fair enough.
And if you look at the bottom of the text exchange, you see that Minister Elgaba reports on February 7th at 8, 23 p.m. that the Ambassador Bridge is now blocked, right?
Yes.
We go now to SSM.can.405290.
The exchange continues.
Minister Mulroney does not respond for about 24 hours, at least if these texts are accurate.
Correct.
And she refers to a letter from Laurie LeBlanc being what addresses the ideas that have been suggested, right?
That's what she says, yes.
Go further down the page.
And Minister O 'Gabbard says he'll look at it, but it would be good to speak tomorrow, right?
Yes.
Go to SSM.can405291.
Mr. Commissioner, I think I've just hit my 20 minutes on my clock.
May I have another four or five minutes?
To complete this area?
Yeah, go ahead.
And at the top of the page you see Minister Mulroney now sends a letter along, says happy to speak once you've had a chance to review, right?
Yes.
Continue down the page.
And you see that by Friday, February 11th, excuse me, sorry, Wednesday, February the 9th, Minister Elgabr is again asking, Who do you recommend in your office we should reach out to for a call, right?
Yes.
Okay.
And I understand they did speak, and we'll come back to Ms. LeBlanc's letter in a moment.
If we could go to...
Well, actually, let's go to the letter briefly.
six.
This is the letter February 8th from Ms. LeBlanc, right?
Yes.
If you go to the third paragraph on the page.
I'm sorry, the fourth paragraph.
She here is, I think, saying roughly what was said in the meeting, right?
That the CVOR sanctions have a complicated administrative process that will...
Require time to be effective, correct?
Yes.
And if you go to page two of the document, she says, I know we all have empathy for the people of Ottawa that are enduring this protest, while also respecting and recognizing the right to peaceful protest, and the MTO will continue to work with Solzhen, right?
Yes.
So no additional contribution from MTO from a regulatory perspective is communicated here?
Not here, no.
But, you know, we did, maybe this isn't your question, but just in case this is helpful, we did, you know, immediately move from this to develop options, which ultimately became later that week, that same week, in the emergency order.
Could we go to SSM.can.401001?
And we'll go to the very end of the document, please.
Just above that, you can see that this is a readout of the February 9th call between Minister Elgaba and Minister Mulroney.
Okay.
Yes.
And the indication here is that Mulroney's message to us is that they see these as federal trade corridors.
They want us to take the lead.
Minister Elgaba pushed on this and said that that would need to be a formal ask.
They have said they don't have the ability to do more from MTO.
They agreed to work with our department to see if there's anything else that can be done.
Overall, I'd say the tone was difficult when they were trying to put this on us.
Were you present at that call?
No.
So if this is Minister Al-Gabbar's recollection of the call, I suppose you wouldn't be able to contest that?
No, I don't know his recollection.
Great.
Sir, you know here on Church Road in Windsor that leads to the Ambassador Bridge?
Yes.
You're aware that's a municipal road where the Windsor Police Service or alternatively the Ontario Provincial Police are police of jurisdiction?
Yes.
And that connects Highway 401 to the Port of Entry.
And 401 is OPP and MTO jurisdiction, right?
Yes.
And similarly, just while we're at this, Wellington Street and the streets of downtown Ottawa under occupation by the Freedom Convoy...
Likewise, we're under the jurisdiction of the Ottawa Police Service or, alternatively, the Ontario Provincial Police and within the authority of MTO from a transport regulation perspective.
Fair?
Yes.
Now, on February 11th, Premier Ford declared a state of emergency and invoked the Ontario Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act?
Yes.
And that was followed by regulations that actually implemented the measures, which did not happen until the 12th, correct?
Yes.
And that was the Saturday of the third weekend of the convoy events?
Yes.
You agree with me that critical infrastructure defined in those regulations included 400 series highways?
Yes.
It did not include municipal roads, right?
Well, it did in that...
And we went through this.
We'd have to bring it up so I could describe, but it does include municipal roads, and those powers were deployed in the City of Ottawa, if that's where you're going.
Okay.
Now, in terms of the power to order to leave or order to depart, right?
All provisions, including CVOR powers that were talked about previously.
You're aware that on February the 14th at approximately 4.30pm, the Prime Minister announced the invocation of the Emergencies Act, right?
Yes.
And you're aware that the Premier of Ontario that morning had expressed his support for the Emergencies Act being invoked during the First Minister's meeting, yes?
I don't recall that specifically, but...
Are you aware that the Premier of Ontario has recently reaffirmed his support, saying that he stood shoulder to shoulder with the Prime Minister in making that decision?
I did see that in the media.
Okay.
and if we just go back very briefly to ont.ir.701.
Actually, I'm sorry, let me just skip that.
Can we go back to ONT.50179?
This is just my last point, Mr. Commissioner.
I apologize.
If we just go to page two, please, the top of the page.
And if you want to look at the header, this is an email which refers to the 10-toe trucks you indicated were sourced for Ottawa when you corrected your witness statement at the beginning of your examination today, correct?
Yes.
And you'll see if you go down to page three in the bullet points, which is an email from earlier on the same day, February 16. There's a third bullet point there that says, important, all three towing companies have requested a letter that the province will cover costs, indemnity from other damage and claims for vehicles that are towed, and so forth, right?
Yes.
And it says that's because their insurance companies have specifically told them that they will not cover those risks, right?
Correct.
And if you go then finally back to the top of page two, this is the evening of February the 16th.
It indicates that one of the three towing companies has in fact dropped out which is what gets you to the number 10 instead of 13 that you thought you had earlier that day, right?
Yes.
And then by now you know about the EA and the first bullet says need a letter from the OPP requesting these two companies to provide services and stating that the Federal Act, that's the Emergencies Act, will cover any damage and indemnity, correct?
Yep.
And if you go to the very very top You see that Jason Boparai is reporting that he's told them, being the towing operators, that this letter will come tomorrow and that they are moving tonight based upon him and Steve's commitment and credibility in the absence of that letter, correct?
Yes.
And we've been through that letter with Commissioner Karik.
Thank you, sir.
Those are my questions.
Thank you for your intelligence, Mr. Commissioner.
Okay.
Thank you.
Next is the City of Windsor.
Good evening, Mr. Freeman.
My name is Jennifer King.
I'm legal counsel to the City of Windsor.
Hi.
In your witness summary, and you've mentioned in your testimony, you state that you're aware that MTO assisted the OPP in identifying contractor to place concrete barriers in Windsor?
Yes.
And this was at the direction of the OPP?
Yes.
I take it that you understand that this was to better manage future risk of vehicles being used for blockades and disruption of cross-border movement of people and goods?
Yes.
Are you aware that there was confusion at MTO at the time as to who would pay for these barriers?
I've subsequently read in the documents that there was questions as to how it would be funded.
Okay, so I'll show you some documents.
If you could please pull up Mr. Clerk, ONT50182.
While this is coming up, Mr. Freeman, this is an email dated February 15th between Josanne Bopare of MTO and Superintendent Dana Early of the OPP.
And the Commissioners heard this week that Superintendent Early shared joint command of the police response to the blockade with Superintendent Crowley of the Windsor Police.
Okay.
And you'll see, if you could scroll down just a little bit, the first bullet, you'll see that it says, upon request by the OPP, MTO has supplied temporary concrete barriers through a contractor.
And if you go to the sub-bullets, and you can see here, partway down, you'll see since these TCBs are being installed along a municipal roadway, MTO has requested the OPP to advise how compensation to the contractor can be arranged.
Next bullet states, preliminary thought from the OPP is that compensation would be through federal funds available to support the emergency response to reopen the Windsor-Detroit crossing.
Do you see that?
Yes.
Were you aware of that at the time?
No, I didn't have any involvement in this at the time.
Okay.
And if you could just scroll up a bit, you'll see that the estimate for the work is $1.3 million.
Yes.
Okay.
If you could please turn up ONT 50438.
This is an internal email exchange at MTO dated February 16th, Mr. Freeman.
And it's involving Doug Jones.
And by February 16th, he is Deputy Minister?
Yes.
Likely his first week on the job.
Okay.
If you could scroll to page three, please.
Thank you.
Further down a bit, please.
There you go.
Thank you.
So on February 16th, Doug Jones is writing to Stefano Oliviero.
Who is that?
That would be an advisor in his office.
Okay.
And you'll see that Doug Jones is talking about a conversation that he has with the CAO of Windsor.
That's Jason Rayner.
And he talks about, again, this issue of costs of the concrete Jersey barriers and a concern that has been raised by Jason Rayner about how much the city would be responsible to cover.
And it's not clear to me based on the, because this is black and white, who made this statement, but someone at MTO was under the impression that the total cost for the installation, removal, and rental of the Jersey barriers would be covered 100% by MTO.
Do you see that?
Yeah, I read this as him asking that question.
Okay.
And so I'll take you to one more document here, WIN402143.
So this is an email exchange between CAO Rainer to individuals at Rainer, so you wouldn't have seen it at the time.
Thank you.
Thank you.
And if you could scroll all the way to the bottom, Mr. Clerk.
Okay.
And you'll see here that he's reporting to individuals at Windsor on February the 17th.
Just a quick update that I had a good call with Deputy Minister Doug Jones, MTO, who is helping to coordinate a planning table with MTO, Civil Gen, OPP, WPS, and Windsor to discuss the long-term needs to protect our international crossings.
I'll let you know once I hear more.
And he continues, the deputy also indicated that he understood but was confirming that costs like the jersey barriers that were authorized by MTO staff at OPP's request would be paid for by the province.
See that?
So if you can scroll up, Mr. Clerk.
And you'll see an email from Mr. Rayner to the same group the next day.
And it states, it would appear that the new deputy minister MTO is finding out just how the province works.
He stepped back from both items today that we discussed earlier in the week.
MTO will not be covering the cost of the barriers, although he said he would not be surprised to see an application for the province to assist with those costs and others, question mark, at some point.
No commitment to pay, though, at this time.
The argument is that we are the road authority and we approve the deployment of the barriers, so therefore are responsible for the costs.
You see that?
Yes.
The Commission heard from the Mayor of Windsor that Windsor has requested that the province reimburse their costs, including the cost of these barriers, but has not received a response.
Do you have any information as to whether or not the province will be reimbursing Windsor's costs?
I haven't seen the request and I don't have any information.
I'm sorry.
Okay.
And if further down, in the next paragraph, Mr. Rayner writes, in terms of the Intergovernmental Planning Table proposal, There's no interest at this time, given the ongoing situation in Ottawa.
I won't take it to you, but the Commissioner heard on Monday from Mayor Dilkens, who testified that he sent a letter in March requesting that all levels of government sit down to discuss working together to protect important international border crossings.
If the Ministry of Transportation is planning to meet with appropriate agencies at all levels of government to discuss protecting critical border crossings in Ontario, such as the Ambassador Bridge?
I'm not aware of what the Ministry intends in this regard.
Again, in my current position as in corporate services, it's not something that I would be aware of.
I do know that the province ultimately did pass further legislation.
I can't speak to who was consulted on that.
Okay, so you don't know if the Municipality of Windsor was consulted on that legislation?
I wasn't involved in it, so I can't say.
Okay.
I only have a few questions left for you.
Do you know if the Ministry has an emergency plan pursuant to the Ontario Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act?
Yes, we do have plans.
Okay.
Which Assistant Deputy Minister at the Ministry of Transportation is responsible for that emergency plan?
I expect it would be Eric Deutsch.
Okay, and what's his title?
He's the Assistant Deputy Minister of our Operations Division.
Okay.
Do you know if the Ministry's Emergency Plan addresses threats to critical transportation infrastructure like the Ambassador Bridge?
I don't know the full scope of the plan, so I can't answer whether it does or not.
Okay, thank you very much.
Those are my questions.
Thank you.
Next is the City of Ottawa.
Good evening.
My name is Anne Tardif.
I'm one of the lawyers representing the City of Ottawa.
Hello.
So, we've explained that the CVOR is the Commercial Vehicle Operator's Registration, right?
Yes.
And you need one to operate a commercial vehicle in Ontario?
Correct.
And the CVOR program monitors and evaluates the operator's safety records?
Yes.
And the CVOR operator, the person who holds the registration, can be either a person or a corporation responsible for the operation of the vehicle?
Yes.
Right.
And I take it it only applies to certain categories of vehicles?
Yes, over a certain weight type.
I have a note here that it's 4,500 kilograms gross weight.
Does that make sense?
That sounds right, yeah.
Perfect.
And we've...
Certainly we've seen in the documents and in your witness summary, reference to a sort of a demerit point system, right?
Yes.
And I take it the CVOR tracks the operator's collisions, right?
Yes.
Infractions?
Yes, convictions, yeah.
Convictions.
And any findings on safety inspections?
That's right.
And over time, they rack up points until...
You get to a state where they have so many points that the ministry may issue notice of the intent to either suspend or revoke the CVOR.
Correct.
Maybe the only thing I would just add to that is there's other interventions before it gets to that point.
That's the end of the process.
Yes.
Right.
And you've talked about the notice requirements, the due process, and the appeal rights that are embedded within the suspension.
Yes.
Right.
And I take it we can agree that certainly some of the large trucks that participated in the convoy in Ottawa had CVORs.
They were of that size.
Yes.
And that at least some of them were involved or were committing or had committed as part of their convoy activities, potentially offenses under the Highway Traffic Act and possibly other statutes and bylaws, right?
I would expect so.
Right.
And if convicted, some of those offenses would end up on their carrier record, right?
Yes.
And contribute to that escalation of points that we've talked about.
Yes.
And I heard you explain that that process takes time, and that's why the ministry thought it's not really a short-term solution, right?
That's part of it.
it's not only that it takes time, it also allows for appeals, hearings, which so I guess that's part of taking time, but it doesn't allow us to take direct immediate action.
Right.
You could issue notice of an infraction, for example, under the Highway Traffic Act today, but it would take perhaps several months, if not longer, to get a conviction for that to be reflected on the carrier record, and you'd need several convictions before you got to the point in time where notice of a suspension would issue.
Likely, yeah.
Right.
Now, I understand that, but you also mentioned, and it was in one of the documents we saw, I can turn it up if I need to, that there was significant considerations with the use of the CVOR for non-roadside enforcement purposes.
And in fairness to you, I wrote down that you said earlier today that you didn't want to use that process, the CVOR process, to dry and do something else, and that there was concern about affecting the legitimacy of the process.
Do you remember saying something to that effect?
Yeah, something to that effect, yeah.
Can you help me understand or help us understand what you mean by that?
I understand the timing concern, but the other concern, this notion that you shouldn't be using...
The CVOR process, the normal process for what you perhaps viewed as an illegitimate or end to which it was not suited.
I think it was just as you've just what you've just said there is the legal analysis and the deputy registrar view, the experts in the ministry, was that if we start to...
Use this for something that it wasn't intended for or we had no process for which.
It questions the ministry's thinking and maybe that applies to other actions that we take in the future.
So, you know, the next time there's a conviction or, sorry, there's an action taken by the ministry, have we shown history of constantly using our processes and legislation?
And, you know, as they were intended for.
I think there was a worry of that as well.
Was the concern, just so I understand, was the concern that if there was a conviction for an offense, for example, under the Highway Traffic Act...
That occurred during the convoy and that ended up on a carrier's record and at some point in the future formed part of notice of suspension or grounds for a suspension of their CVOR.
Was that a concern to the ministry?
No.
Okay.
So it was just a bypassing your normal process that was a concern to the ministry?
Yes.
Bypassing the normal process and using it for something that has never been used in the past or intended to be.
What is that something?
That's, I think, what I'm struggling to understand.
To try and address a protest or a civil unrest situation, not to address specifically a case where we have a well-documented safety record and police records to us requesting certain activities.
Understood.
Thank you.
Could we pull up ONT50111?
And could we scroll to the bottom?
Sorry, yeah, just to the top of that email.
Perfect.
You were taken to this email, Mr. Freeman, but not to this part of the chain.
This is an email from Mr. I'm going to pronounce it Beau Parai.
I apologize if I'm butchering that.
And if we scroll down, we can see in his signature block a little bit further down.
Mr. Clark, thank you.
He's with the MTO, correct?
Yes.
With the Highway Operations Management?
Yes.
We'll scroll up a little bit.
He says, good evening, Chief Superintendent Carson Party.
So Chief Superintendent Party is with the OPP.
We heard from him earlier in this inquiry.
And he says, my apologies for the cold call.
I've been working with Chief Superintendent Thompson and Superintendent Eaton on some other files and have recently been asked to lead, coordinate MTO's overall response at the provincial level related to various...
And I'll slow down here.
Blockades in the province.
I am reaching out to you regarding the ongoing blockade at the Windsor-Detroit Bridge.
And I'll pause here because Chief Superintendent Party was actually in charge in Ottawa, not in Windsor.
Mr. Beau Parai was confused and that gets cleared up, pardon me, up the chain.
He says, we are wondering whether the OPP has been collecting CVOR information of trucks blocking the bridge crossing, and if available, can this information be shared with MTO?
This will allow us to review and be better prepared to support the OPP as this situation continues to evolve.
Would be great if we can discuss this further, or if you can connect us with the appropriate OPP contact.
Thanks.
And if we scroll up, just so you can get the context, Mr. Freeman.
That's Chief Superintendent Party's response advising that he's in Ottawa, leading the support plan for the OPS and advising him who's in charge in Winster and giving some additional information.
The reason I bring this to your attention is I had understood that in fact the position of the MTO was not to reach out and offer to assist with CVOR, but only to act in response to specific police requests.
I think we were trying to get a handle as to...
There was a couple things.
The first, I recall, there was antidotal communication we had heard that...
Actually, at the bridge, it was mostly non-commercial vehicles, and I think we wanted to know if that was actually the case.
We just wanted to understand more.
We were having all sorts of discussions as to how we can help.
I think it's important to know we were certainly there to support the OPP, but at this time...
We had been having discussions with the federal government and others about what else can the province do.
At this time, we were looking at what sort of, because we believe the CVOR did not work, what could we do?
And that's how the emergency order came about.
I shouldn't say that's how the emergency order came about.
That's part of what went into the emergency order within a matter of two days.
Was new powers that could do what was being asked.
So we were looking at all sorts of different angles.
We were there to assist the OPP.
We weren't doing any direct enforcement, but we were trying to gather information just like many other people were as well.
So we were looking at all sorts of ideas.
And I think this also connected, there was just a question like, could we start calling CVOR operators to tell them?
That their truck might be there.
This was just one of the many angles we were trying to do to try and help solve the situation that week.
Just because we didn't think the CVOR was the right way to go, it didn't mean we weren't trying to find other ways to address the situation that week.
Thank you.
Those are my questions.
Thank you.
Next is the CCLA.
Good evening, Mr. Freeman.
My name is Eva Krajewska, and I'm counsel for the Canadian Civil Liberties Association.
Mr. Freeman, let me just start off with respect to what is the MTO's role in...
Public protests or public demonstrations when they block highways or roads.
Would you say that it's typical or not unusual for public demonstrations to create or inhibit traffic?
They can, certainly.
And the ministry's role would be the same as I've described, to assist.
Right.
And would it also be fair to say that you would also create signage and divert traffic as necessary in order to facilitate the demonstration?
Yes, as requested by police.
So you would be guided by the OPP or the police of the jurisdiction to provide that assistance?
To facilitate the protest?
Yes.
And as would then be also consistent, we looked at the MTO's plan with respect to the Freedom Convoy.
My friend for the Government of Canada took you to the fact that the MTO suspended the inspections of trucks through the convoy.
Was that also kind of part of facilitating the protest at the time?
I don't know if it was intended to facilitate...
I think it was based on the direction from the OPP to not engage in that way.
I just don't know if the intent was, as you've described, to facilitate a protest or not.
Okay, but other than with respect to direction from the OPP or police forces, the MTO would not take enforcement measures against a demonstration.
Correct.
And I know many of us have covered the CVOR issue.
And if I could just go back to that again.
The letter to Michael Keenan that you were taken to earlier, it's clear that the enforcement under CVOR, the purpose is public safety, correct?
No.
Purpose is highway and safety of traveling public.
Right.
And to sanction non-compliance safety behavior.
Yes.
And as you told my friend, Ms. Tardiff, your concern or the MTO's concern about using the CVOR...
Was that you did not want it to be used in relation to civil disobedience?
It wasn't so much that we didn't want to.
It was that it wasn't intended or ever used in that way, nor do the procedures or the policies that the practical application of it was ever intended for it to be used that way.
The Highway Traffic Act.
As legislation is about safety for traveling public and, you know, motor vehicles, not about public order or protests.
It was never, that's not its purpose.
And was there also a concern of setting a precedent to use the Sea View as a method of enforcement against civil disobedience?
I don't know if it was so much that it was a precedent.
Worry of a precedent.
It was worry that it didn't actually do what people were asking it to do.
And was there also concern that you would delegitimize the process that exists with respect to the CVOR and how it's understood by both the government and industry participants?
Yeah, that was a concern.
I'm just going through my notes because some of these issues have already been covered.
And my friend for the Government of Canada took you to the fact that the Ontario Declaration of Emergency was declared on February 11, 2022, but the letters with respect to the CVOR enforcement under the EMPCA were not issued until February 17. And you stated that that was an OPP decision
as to when to issue those letters, when to issue those warnings?
I don't know if it was OPP, but it was a policing decision.
It was not an MTO decision.
Correct.
Mr. Freeman, did you have input to Minister Mulroney into what the MTO would be requesting under the EMPCA?
Did you provide input as to what cabinet should consider before the EMPCA was relied upon?
We provided, yes.
So after we determined that the CVOR was not the appropriate...
We began to develop options that could potentially be used.
We did brief the minister on that.
Ultimately, we provided input into what the Ministry of the Solicitor General was developing for which they used.
And can you provide us kind of an outline of the options that you provided to your minister and to the Solicitor General?
Well, we provided options looking at increased changes to, for example, new legislation or changes to the HTA penalties that could exist, those types of things.
So amendments that could be done to the HTA to increase fines or increase enforcement?
Yeah.
Thank you, Commissioner.
Those are my questions.
Thank you.
Next, the CCF.
Mr. Freeman, good afternoon.
My name is Ajit Chodray.
I'm with the CCF.
I have some questions for you about tow trucks.
Okay.
And the legal tools to compel the provision of tow truck services.
So I first asked a Registrar to put up the Emergency Measures Regulations under the Emergencies Act, and I have a document code for that, although I imagine it would be on speed dial here.
So it's but it's ssm.can.401911 _rel.
Three zeros one.
So while we're waiting for it to come up, I take it you're familiar with the emergency measures regulations?
I'm familiar, but by no means an extra.
You referred to them in an answer to a question posed by my friend from the Commission though.
Yeah.
So could we go to page eight, please?
So, if you could just scroll down, please, Mr. Registrar to 7-1.
That's good.
So, would you agree, if you could just have a look at Section 7-1, have you seen that section before?
Yes.
Okay.
So, would you agree that Section 7-1 in substance says that a person must make available and provide tow truck services?
If requested by the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness or the RCMP Commissioner or a designate.
Correct?
Yes.
Good.
Okay.
Scooby, go down then to the next page, please.
To 10 sub 2. And so could you just have a look at that, please?
Have you seen this provision before?
Yes.
So would you agree that in substance, section 10 sub 2 provides, that creates a criminal offense for a failure to comply with the emergency measures regulations, including the provision we just looked at together, section 7 sub 1, in relation to tow trucks?
That's what it appears to do.
And there's sanctions involving both fines and imprisonment under both summary and indictment.
Yes.
Good.
All right.
Now, I'd like to take you to the HTA, if I could.
And so, this document, Mr. Registrar, is CCF five zeros, I believe.
Yes.
Wait.
Six zeros.
Ten.
And while we're waiting for it to come up, Mr. Freeman, you stated in your evidence this morning, or earlier today, I should say, that the HTA is a key act.
We're going to take you to Section 171.
so this is on page 361 please If we could scroll down just a bit.
Okay, so if we could stop there.
So this section is entitled Tow Truck Services.
Are you familiar with this section?
Not in great detail, but I can understand it.
Okay, so I'd like to ask you a question that's about section sub 3.1, which is on the next page.
Let's stop there.
So this says, so the...
The title for this subsection is Other Prohibited Activities, and it says no driver of a tow truck or other person who is in charge of a tow truck shall engage in an activity prohibited by regulation.
Is that right?
That's what it says, yes.
Okay, now let's go down a bit further to subsection 6. Stop there, please.
And so subsection 6 says...
That the Lieutenant Governor in Council, or the Provincial Cabinet, has the power under Subsection B to prescribe prohibited activities for the purposes of Subsection 3.1.
Is that right?
Yes.
And that seems to be quite a broad grant of authority to the Provincial Cabinet, correct?
You're getting a little out of my depth in terms of legal interpretation here, whether it's broad or not.
But it says that it doesn't say what sorts of activities can be prescribed.
It just says prescribed activities.
Prescribing prohibitive activities, yes.
Correct, correct.
Okay.
For the purposes of what's above, but...
You know, I just want to refrain from trying to interpret this too much here.
It's beyond my expertise.
And then let's go up a little.
I promise you this is the last subsection we'll look at together.
So if you could scroll up, please, Mr. Registrar, to subsection four.
And so this provision is entitled offense.
It creates a provincial offense for breaching any provision in this section, which it would include, of course, Any regulation enacted pursuant to Subsection 3.1, correct?
Yes.
So, Mr. Freeman, I'd like to ask you this.
Would you agree that under Section 171, at any time, the Ontario Cabinet could have made it a regulation that a tow truck driver cannot deny a tow truck services if requested?
By a suitable public official?
So a municipal chief of police, the LPP commissioner, or the head of the RCMP?
I don't know the answer to that.
There could be other provisions here that suggest otherwise.
I don't know this well enough.
So Mr. Freeman, I'm going to press you on this a bit.
I put it to you that this is the only section In the HTA governing tow trucks.
And that under this section, the provincial cabinet can prescribe conduct by tow truck drivers.
And that it's an offense if a tow truck driver breaches that requirement.
I'm not a lawyer, and any time we would say what we can or can't do, we would...
It's something we would engage our council on.
So I don't want to tie myself to an answer that I could be wrong for the commission.
So, Mr. Freeman, I'll conclude on this note then.
If, in fact, the provincial cabinet could have passed a regulation requiring that a tow truck driver provide a service and making it an offense to not do so, would that not, in substance, Have been the same as the corresponding provision in the emergency measures regulation?
I think based on what you said, possibly, yes.
Thank you.
Okay, next to the convoy organizers.
Good evening.
My name is Brendan Miller and I'm counsel for Freedom Corp, which is the organization that represents the protesters that were in Ottawa in February and January of 2022.
I have a couple of questions for you, sir.
Are you familiar, I'm assuming you're familiar with most transportation law, I know my friend has put some things to you and that you talk to lawyers, but are you familiar with the International Bridges and Tunnels Act?
Not in any sort of depth.
Okay.
But you're familiar of its existence?
Yes.
And that's a federal law?
That's my understanding.
Right.
And I understand it that that law is governed by the Federal Minister of Transportation, is that correct?
That I don't know.
Okay.
Are you aware that under that Act, that at any time, for the purpose of safety...
...in security that the Federal Minister of Transport, if the Minister is of the opinion that there is an immediate threat to the security or safety of any international bridge or tunnel, the Minister may make directions, including directions respecting the evacuation of a bridge or tunnel and the diversion of traffic or persons, requiring any person to do or refrain from doing anything that, in the opinion of the Minister, is appropriate to do or refrain from doing.
In order to respond to that threat.
So he's permitted to just pass an order to vacate the bridge, vacate the area.
Would that have been helpful?
Well, I'm...
So two things.
Without the act in front of me, I can't say that that's part of it or not.
You know, I don't work for the federal government.
And again, police were leading the response, so you'd have to ask police whether or not that would have been helpful.
And this protest, it started on the 7th?
No.
7th of February?
Oh, sorry, you're talking about in Windsor.
I believe that's the date.
Right.
And they cleared it on the 12th?
12th and 13th, I believe, yes.
Before the Emergencies Act?
Yes.
And at no time did the Minister pass a regulation in order to vacate that bridge?
The Federal Minister?
Not to my knowledge.
Thank you.
Okay, next to the Ottawa Residents Coalition.
Good evening, Commissioner Emily Tamman for the Ottawa Coalition of Residents and Businesses.
We don't have any questions.
Thank you.
Okay.
The Windsor Police Service.
Good evening, Mr. Commissioner.
Tom McRae for the Windsor Police Service.
We have no questions.
the Ottawa Police Service.
Good evening, Mr. Freeman.
My name is David Michikowski.
I'm a lawyer for the Ottawa Police Service.
Hello.
You were asked some questions by one of my colleagues earlier about MTO enforcement officers in Ottawa, and I believe you weren't certain if they were used in Ottawa on the first weekend, so I'm going to see if I can help you.
If we could call up, Mr. Clerk, ONT40-0272, please.
page one At the bottom of page one.
These are situational reports that the MTO puts out and you'll see at the bottom of page one.
So this is January 28th.
This would be the Friday.
And we see convoy arrived in Ottawa starting at approximately one.
And it says MTO officers will assist as usual practice if requested by OPP.
No current request for assistance.
And so I'll take you to then the one for the following day, which would be the Saturday.
And if we go to...
7273, please, on page 2. And if you just scroll up a little bit, please.
No, the other way.
I'm sorry.
Scroll down.
Thank you.
So you'll see on January 29th, so that's the Saturday, convoys to arrive at Parliament Hill.
MTO officers will assist as usual practice if requested by OPP.
No current request for assistance.
Do you see that?
Yes.
And so as I understand it, and so I believe MTO...
Did have enforcement officers there for the subsequent weekends, if I'm not mistaken.
I believe they were as well.
Right.
In Toronto, we know, however, that MTO was asked in advance of the February 1st convoy arrival to be on the GTA highways by the OPP, partly as a deterrent and to provide support to the OPP, correct?
Yes.
And so that was in advance.
It was the day before, I believe.
Is that correct?
I don't remember the exact time, but it was in advance of the expected weekend protests.
And the focus was on the routes going into downtown and the 400 series highways.
Yes.
And that's because you had the Ottawa experience, so Toronto was treated a bit differently.
Again, we weren't making decisions.
It was the police who asked for the help, so one could imagine that might have been Why they wanted to do that.
And it was the OPP who specifically asked for MTO to be involved.
And Ottawa was always expected to be a peaceful event, I believe.
That was in the original operational plan of the MTO and the original announcement on January 21st that we saw, correct?
That was MTO's understanding, yes.
MTO, we saw, I took you...
When I started the situation reports, and I understand those situation reports came out virtually every day and sometimes a couple times a day during the convoy?
Yes.
And so you would agree with me, I've looked at the situational reports for January 23 up to January 28. There's no reference in them to the convoy causing major problems or to how long.
They're going to be in Ottawa.
Is that recorded with your recollection?
I don't recall them speaking to the timelines or level of disruption.
Right.
And I won't call up the documents, but just for the record, it is ONT40-0260-0272.
And it is only on January 29th, which is ONT-40-0273.
Mr. Clerk, if we could please turn that up on page one.
And if we could just scroll down, please.
Yeah, sorry, if you can just stop there.
Thanks very much.
Information received, so this is January 29th, information received that the convoy protesters may stay in Ottawa for up to a month or longer if their demands are not met.
So that's on Saturday when the convoy is already there.
And so...
Up until then, I did not see it referenced, so I take it it only became relevant on the Saturday when they were already there.
Is that right?
Well, that, I don't know about relevant, but that's maybe when whatever intelligence the enforcement community at MTO had became apparent.
And if I look at all of the operational updates prior to January 29th, all of them refer to the convoy, but don't note any particular concerns.
There's a heading on those documents called Operational Updates and Impacts, and there's nothing of particular concern raised in any of them.
Is that fair?
I would have to look at them, but I don't recall that being the case.
And probably consistent with MTO's role for, you know, protests is we don't get the same level of intelligence that police do.
So that might have been the understanding of those who are involved at the time.
Sure.
I believe I've used my time, Mr. Commissioner.
If I may have another just a couple of minutes.
Sure.
Thank you very much.
I know on January 26, and I can call it up if you need it, but on the January 26 operational update, I saw on page one, and it was ONT40's 0267, there's mention that one of the convoys there is about 135 kilometres length, but there doesn't seem to be any particular concern noted.
Do you recall?
It's actually in the fourth, third paragraph.
I'm sorry.
And there doesn't seem to be any concern noted.
MTO wasn't trying to stop it on the highway or slow it down or divert it.
Well, MTO wouldn't have that role again in a protest situation.
Police would be the lead and we would be there to assist.
I don't know in any of these that the level of concern is ever indicated.
And I was not involved in these early reports.
So I'm seeing them for the first time when we've...
Sure.
In fact, the operational plan of the MTO says officers will not be involved in the commercial vehicle traffic stops of people in the convoy, correct?
That was the direction you had from the OPP?
Yes.
And MTO, I believe, says in their plans that they recognize the right to peaceful protest, which is what this was supposed to be, correct?
That's what we...
Understood it to be.
I won't call it up, but there's reference to, and I don't believe you were at the meeting, but there was a tripartite meeting, and it's SSM-CAN.NSC402676.
On page 2 of 4, one of the issues raised, and I believe it was raised by Mayor Watson, was a request that the MTO at that point, it was February 10th, get more involved and noted that the MTO always sets up blitzes on 400 highways, but haven't done so in this case.
Is that correct?
I would have to see the document, but are you asking, is his statement correct?
No, I'm asking, yeah, is that statement correct, that the MTO does do blitzes on 400 series highways, but did not do so in this case?
MTO does do enforcement blitzes, not directly on the highways, but near highways.
In this case, we were asked not to do that type of work by police, by the OPPA.
And sorry, just to finish off, I want to ask you a question regarding weigh scales.
And one of the things considered by the MTO was to look at what Quebec did, because they had a convoy as well.
And I understand they set up truck inspection.
But Ontario chose not to do that.
Is that correct?
That's my understanding.
And the question was raised, and it is ONT40092.
The question was raised about whether weigh scales could be used to slow down the convoy as was done in Quebec.
But a decision was made not to do that in Ontario, correct?
Yes, that's my understanding.
And it's on page two, actually.
Yeah.
And And I understand that under the Highway Traffic Act, MTO officers may stop vehicles and direct them to weigh stations, correct?
You have that authority?
Yes.
And if weigh stations are open, trucks have to stop and be subject to inspection, check for weight, height, length, axles, proper class of license, etc.
Yes.
Okay.
Thanks very much.
Those are my questions.
Okay, next is the Ontario Provincial Police.
Thank you, Commissioner.
It's Jananne Kabursi, and I have no questions.
Thank you.
Council for former Chief Slowly.
Thank you, Commissioner.
Tom Curry for former Chief Slowly, and we also have no questions.
Government of Saskatchewan.
Good evening, Mr. Freeman.
Can you hear me?
Yes.
Thank you.
My name is Mike Morris and I'm counsel for the government of Saskatchewan.
I just have a few questions for you.
Sure.
Mr. Freeman, I expect you're familiar with the Council of Ministers responsible for transportation and highway safety?
Yes.
And I understand that that council involves federal, provincial, and territorial ministers and officials.
Is that correct?
Yes.
And there is an ADM level table for that council, correct?
Yes, yep.
And do you sit on that ADM level table?
I don't in my current role, but I did in the role that I was in during the time of the protests.
And I'm interested in February of 2022 during the protests, so you did participate in that table at that time, correct?
And am I correct that officials from the government of Saskatchewan also participated in that table at that time?
Yes.
And this has been referenced already in your evidence, but I understand that there were meetings of the ADM level table on February 4th and 8th.
Does that accord with your recollection?
Yes.
And maybe just to clarify, too, it wasn't a formal committee meeting, but members of the committee were meeting informally at the request of Transport Canada.
Yes, my understanding is that the meetings were organized by Transport Canada, and they were specifically because Transport Canada wanted to develop a common strategy to deal with demonstrations on roadways.
Is that fair?
Yes, that was part of the purpose.
Absolutely.
And these were effectively ad hoc meetings then.
Is that what you're indicating?
Yes.
And they were organized then on relatively short notice?
Yes.
And then in your experience, such FPT meetings can be set up on very short notice.
Is that fair?
Yes.
And can they even be set up on weekends if needed?
They certainly.
People can ask to meet on the weekend.
Again, I don't know that formal committee meetings would ever occur, but informal meetings I could imagine could be called at any time.
And during those meetings on February 4th and February 8th that were set up on short notice and which were ad hoc meetings, you had good participation from the FPT representatives, did you not?
That's my recollection, yes.
I also understand that there was discussion at those meetings about, of course, this common strategy to deal with demonstrations on roadways, but that that discussion was really about what might be accomplished with existing provincial and federal law.
Is that fair to say?
Yes, that would be part of the conversation as well.
You'll correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that there was no discussion.
Of the federal government potentially invoking the Emergencies Act at those meetings on February 4th or 8th, was there?
I don't recall it or see it in any meeting summaries, no.
That would have been a big deal if there was discussion of that nature, wouldn't it?
Maybe to clarify, this is Ministries of Transportation typically, so something like that.
Might not be raised at that meeting because it's not necessarily a transportation tool, but yes, I would think it would be something we would remember and would report back on.
And in your view, would those meetings have been an appropriate forum for the potential invocation of the Federal Emergencies Act to be discussed?
And I'm thinking particularly because you have MTO officers that may need to exercise certain responsibilities if the federal law was used and new responsibilities were placed on them.
I don't know.
I don't know if I can answer whether it's fair or not.
Certainly, having...
Time and awareness would be well, but I also know this is a very big instrument for the federal government to use, and I don't know that they would start with that group to speak to first.
If that information were made available to you, for example, on February 8th, it would have been valuable and you would have been pleased to receive it, correct?
I mean, the more information is always better, but I don't know if I would agree that we would expect to hear about the federal government choosing to invoke such a legislation or a tool.
At that type of meeting.
That would be my sense.
I don't know.
I wouldn't expect to hear something like that in that committee.
It might be above your pay grade.
Is that what you're indicating?
Yes.
Okay.
Thank you, sir.
Those are my questions.
Okay.
Next, the government of Alberta, please.
Good evening.
I'm Honolori Yamamoto for the Government of Alberta and we have no questions.
Thank you.
The Democracy Fund, please.
Good evening.
It's Alan Honor for the Democracy Fund.
Can you hear me?
Yes.
Thank you.
I'd just like to ask you a few questions about tow trucks.
Can we pull up?
ONT.403842.
This is a document that my friend from the Government of Canada showed you earlier today.
Okay.
Pardon me.
I'm sorry.
I think that's...
not the right document.
Four zeros, three eight four two.
I'm sorry, just bear with me for a moment, please.
Sorry, that was 3842-O-1-T-4-0-3-8-4-2?
Yes, that's correct.
Sorry, can we try O-1-T-5-0-1-7-9?
I'm looking for an email here from Jason Porazzi.
That's it.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Okay, so as I was saying, this is a document that my friend from the Government of Canada showed you earlier today.
If we look at the top of the second page, so if we can just scroll down there, what we see here.
And actually, if you can just scroll up a little bit.
Okay, so you see just up at the top, this is an email from Jason Baravi, and later in the text of the email, he says that the third...
Towing company has dropped out and that you're now down to 10 tow trucks.
Do you see that?
Yes.
Okay, and if you just scroll down to page three, a little bit lower.
That's good.
In the first point in this email, which is dated February 16th, we see that the 13 trucks are heavy tow trucks.
Do you see that?
Yes.
So what you're down to now is 10 heavy tow trucks as opposed to 13 heavy tow trucks?
Yes.
Okay.
And would you agree with me that if the companies were being compelled to provide tow truck services under the Emergencies Act or the measures available to them, they would not be able to drop out?
That's my understanding of the federal legislation, yes.
Right.
And so this email suggests, when we read that somebody dropped out, that the three towing companies were providing their services willingly.
Yes.
Thank you very much.
Those are my questions.
Thank you.
The CLA, CCDL.
Good evening.
Mr. Freeman, can you hear me all right?
I can.
My name is Colleen McEwen, and I'm counsel to the Criminal Lawyers Association and the Canadian Council of Criminal Defense Lawyers, two organizations with joint standing.
I know I'm standing between everyone and dinner, so I'd like to ask you just a few questions about the role and the limitations of the Highway Traffic Act and the CVOR system.
And I know my friends from the City of Ottawa and the CCLA have already asked you some related questions, so I'm going to try to be brief.
Okay.
You said in your witness statement and I've repeated here that addressing protests is not the purpose of the Highway Traffic Act or its associated licensing tools.
Do I have that right?
Yes.
Instead, the purpose of the HTA is to keep traffic flowing and keep the roads safe.
Is that fair?
It's primarily safety legislation, yes.
Okay.
And you identified in your witness statement some of the provisions in the Highway Traffic Act that would make it an offense for individuals to block a highway.
And in the interest of time, I'm not going to pull up your witness statement, but you identified a few provisions.
Is that right?
Yes.
There's Section 170, Subsection 12, which prohibits parking or standing a vehicle in a way that interferes with traffic.
Is that one of the sections?
Yep.
Yes.
And then Section 132, which prohibits unnecessarily slow driving that impedes or blocks traffic.
Is that one?
That sounds right, yeah.
And then Section 134.1, which authorizes police to direct the removal and storage of vehicles or debris blocking traffic.
Yes.
Is that right?
Yes.
And of course, you knew at the time that parking vehicles in the roadway was something that protesters did both in Ottawa and in Windsor.
Is that right?
Yes.
And that's why you pointed to these particular provisions in your witness statement.
Yes, I think I might have.
I maybe was asked for relevant provisions, but yes, that's why.
These are the ones that are responsive to that concern.
Yes.
And you'd agree with me that blocking a road can interfere with keeping traffic flowing and keeping roads safe.
Yes.
Okay, and you told us a little bit today about some of the ways the HTA and associated licensing tools can't be sort of used properly.
And for example, you explained that the MTO was concerned about delegitimizing the CVOR certificate system.
By misusing it in the context of civil disobedience.
Do I have that right?
That was part of the concern, yes.
And the MTO took the position that the scheme couldn't be used to just cancel a CVR certificate outright, at least not until the emergency order was in place.
That's right, not without the due process and the collecting of evidence and following the steps.
Right.
That's the lengthy process that several counsel took you through.
And sort of shortcutting that, that's the kind of action that would be a misuse of the CVOR scheme.
Yes.
Or a misuse of the demerit point scheme for outside the commercial trucking context.
Right.
But I take it that it's not the MTO's position that the police should refrain from laying charges under the Highway Traffic Act.
Where appropriate, simply because this was a protest.
Well, I don't believe we have an opinion on what police do or don't do.
That's up to police in the context of the situation that they're dealing with.
Right, because that's a policing decision, whether or not to lay charges, whether it's an appropriate situation, whether there are other concerns.
That's a policing decision, not a decision that comes from the MTO.
That's right.
Okay, but so police deciding to lay charges under the HTA, that's not something that would be the kind of misuse that the MTO was concerned about.
Correct.
And so should the Commission understand your comments about the role of the HTA as being related specifically to the suggestion that perhaps the MTO could get involved and cancel licenses or cancel CVOR schemes?
So I guess my question is...
Is your comment about the limited use of the HTA specifically responsive to that sort of suggestion that was being made perhaps by Transport Canada?
They tried to understand the scheme, perhaps by commentators in the media.
So should we understand your comment in light of those suggestions?
Yes, it was more specific to what MTO should do, not an opinion on what police should or shouldn't do.
Okay, thank you very much.
Those are my questions.
Thank you.
Any re-examination?
No.
Okay, well, I just have a couple of quick questions.
Just in terms of the demerit system, you talked about the problem that...
The regulation of trucks and their CVROR is provincial.
Yes.
Is there no mechanism for transferring demerit points from one province to another if a vehicle from another province truck incurs offences of some sort?
No, there is.
So my understanding is convictions that would happen in one jurisdiction are shared with the home jurisdiction and would go on their record there.
What doesn't happen is the points that are accumulated in Ontario care, there's no...
Sorry, I'm not doing a very good job explaining this.
So maybe to really quickly better answer the question, if there's a conviction that happens in Ontario, another jurisdiction would report that on their carrier's record.
So I'm trying to understand what the problem was because of trucks from outside of Ontario.
You'd mentioned that was a problem, and I'm not understanding it.
Well, so if we took action specifically, we can only take action...
From a sanctioning action on Ontario carriers, meaning we can only suspend Ontario carriers, CVOR.
We don't have the ability to remove or suspend the licensing of an out-of-province carrier.
If police lay charges and there's convictions in Ontario, that would go on their home record.
What that province does and how that impacts their license in that jurisdiction, Ontario has no control over.
Does that help clarify?
It doesn't.
It doesn't.
I would expect the consequences are probably fairly similar from one province to another.
An accumulation of offenses?
Absolutely.
I would think that they would be somewhat similar from province to province, although I can't speak to what other provinces have.
The suggestion was more in response to, at the time, there was a suggestion, well, why don't we just cancel or suspend their CVORs or equivalent in other provinces?
And the point that was being made is Ontario doesn't have the power to suspend or cancel other provinces' abilities to operate.
I understand that, but I think I also understood you to say Ontario didn't have that power either without going through charges, etc.
This is true.
I don't know that we were trying to say anything other than that we have control over the Ontario population of carriers.
We do not have oversight of out-of-province carriers.
I guess that's...
I might not agree in the sense that you have the same oversight.
You're supposed to supervise and charge them.
Make sure that they're behaving in the same way an Ontario carrier would.
Well, police would lay charges or our enforcement officers for specific infractions, but the role of the registrar or the deputy registrar in sanctioning them only applies to Ontario carriers.
Maybe that's a better way to describe it.
I understand that.
Now, one of the things I wanted to also understand is the emergency...
Regulation in Ontario, it provided powers with respect to the licenses, the CVROR.
Isn't that correct?
Yes.
Now, what's the process there?
Is it a charge to which they will then have to go to court and they have a right to appeal?
Specifically with the emergency order, there was no rights to appeal.
It was a direct sanction that the registrar could apply.
So it's suspension immediate, which is the difference with the process of...
And the emergency order, you said at one point that there was no provision with respect to tow trucks in Ontario's order.
Related, I think, specifically, I think I was referring to...
To direct that tow truck must comply or any sort of indemnification.
Yeah, so there was nothing in the emergency order in Ontario?
Correct.
And do you know if your ministry had requested that that be included?
I don't recall a request on that.
Do you know if anyone else requested?
Any other ministry or police requested?
I don't know.
Okay, those are my questions.
Thanks very much for your testimony and thank you for accommodating the Commission by switching.
That's much appreciated.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you.
So, we are complete for today and we will come back tomorrow morning at 9:30 and we hope to...
Well, it'll be a fairly long day tomorrow again, but...
Nothing new there.
Adjourn until tomorrow morning at 9:30.
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