August 9, 2024 - "The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms is pleased to announce that all charges against peaceful Freedom Convoy protestor Ben Spicer have been dropped. Mr. Spicer was arrested in Ottawa on February 19, 2022, and charged with mischief, obstructing justice, and weapons charges. In his decision, Justice Timothy Lipson ruled that a secret recording of Mr. Spicer violated his Charter rights....
"Mr. Spicer attended the peaceful Freedom Convoy protest in the nation’s capital. He was standing near the intersection of Bank Street and Sparks Street when police struck him at least twice in the midsection. An officer pulled him off the ground and handed him over to another officer. His backpack and jacket were searched, revealing a can of bear spray and a folding pocketknife. He explained that these were from a recent hiking trip. He had not taken the items out of his backpack or jacket at any time during the protest.
"Officers loaded Mr. Spicer into a police van – equipped with a video and audio recording device. Mr. Spicer was not aware that he was being recorded. There were no signs, and he was not told by the officers. At no point was Mr. Spicer able to access legal counsel.
"His trial proceeded at the Ontario Court of Justice from November 6 to 8, 2023, and again from April 16 to 18, 2024. The Crown tried to submit the recording as evidence against Mr. Spicer. They argued that the Court should infer criminal activity from the contents of the recording and that Mr. Spicer had no reasonable expectation of privacy in a police vehicle.... On August 2, 2024, Justice Lipson ruled that Mr. Spicer had a reasonable expectation of privacy while in custody, especially since Mr. Spicer is presumed innocent until proven guilty. Because Justice Lipson found that the secret recording violated Mr. Spicer’s privacy rights, the recording was excluded as evidence from the trial.
"Justice Lipson also found that police had no grounds for the arrest. Indeed, police had breached his right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned – protected by section 9 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Because his arrest was unlawful, Justice Lipson ruled that the search of his backpack and jacket was also unlawful and excluded the contents as evidence as well.... Finally, Justice Lipson found that police had breached his right to retain and instruct counsel without delay – protected by section 10(b) of the Charter. All charges against Mr. Spicer were dismissed....
"Lawyer Monick Grenier stated, 'I am very satisfied that the judge recognized serious breaches of Mr. Spicer’s section 8, 9, and 10(b) Charter rights, and excluded the evidence after conducting an analysis, effectively gutting the Crown’s case.'
"Mr. Spicer stated, “I am extremely grateful for everything that the Justice Centre and Ms. Grenier has done. I thank the Justice Centre for funding my defence, with particular thanks to all those who donated.'"
An Access to Information request has turned up another Canadian government contract, of almost a quarter of a Billion dollars, for Covid-19 ventilators which ended up being scrapped – in this case because they failed safety tests.
August 11, 2024 - "Taxpayers were billed top dollar for Québec-made COVID-19 ventilators that were later discarded as scrap metal, according to Access to Information records. Blacklock's Reporter says a contract worth $231.7 million to purchase ventilators at $28,250 each was signed after then-Industry Minister Navdeep Bains had a private discussion with the company’s CEO....
"CAE Incorporated of Montréal, formerly Canadian Aviation Electronics, received $231,650,000 for 8,200 ventilators, equating to $28,250 per unit. This was the highest price the Public Health Agency paid for any Canadian ventilator during the pandemic. 'When it comes to CAE, it’s a great Canadian success story,' Bains testified during 2020 hearings of the Commons industry committee....
"Despite never having manufactured ventilators, CAE received its contract on April 9, just days before Bains’ testimony. The devices later failed Department of Health safety tests....
"CAE rehired approximately 1,500 employees who had been laid off at the start of the pandemic and received a cash advance to manufacture the ventilators. The terms of the advance payment were not disclosed, though other firms received advances between $20 million and $40 million.
"Records indicate the Department of Health paid CAE a premium of 25 to 49% more than it paid other suppliers. The $28,250 per CAE device compared to $23,730 per ventilator from Baylis Medical of Montréal, $22,600 per ventilator from StarFish Medical of Toronto, and $18,993 per ventilator from Thornhill Medical of North York, Ont. 'We went from a letter of intent to a purchase order, and now they will be delivering the ventilators in a matter of weeks,' Bains said at the time. 'This is really promising news for us because we are in a position to help not only Canadians but possibly other jurisdictions and other countries as well.'
"None of the CAE devices were known to be used in any medical setting. Documents reveal that of the 8,200 CAE ventilators delivered at taxpayers’ expense, 8,180 — or 99% — were “slated for sale as scrap metal.” Records did not disclose what the Public Health Agency did with the remaining 20 devices.
"Government caucus members defended the CAE contract at the time.... 'Canadians needed to feel that ventilators would be accessible if ever the second wave were to come and they finally would need a hospital and extra help because of the virus,' said Liberal MP Emmanuella Lambropoulos (Saint-Laurent, Que.) during a 2020 hearing of the Commons ethics committee. CAE’s plant is located in Lambropoulos’ riding....
"Records show the Covid ventilators were immediately warehoused and then auctioned off as scrap metal as early as 2021.Lambropoulos did not respond to questions from Blacklock’s Reporter. Bains resigned from the cabinet on January 12, 2021, and left Parliament eight months later. He is currently an executive with Rogers Communications in Toronto."
The Ontario Court of Appeal has ruled that Section 99(1)(a) of Canada's Customs Act, which allows border agents to search personal digital devices without consent on mere suspicion, is unconstitutional as written, and has given Parliament six months to rewrite the law.
August 10, 2024 - "A law that allows border agents to search personal electronic devices, including computers and smartphones, violates Canadians’ charter rights, Ontario’s top court has ruled, telling Parliament it needs to rewrite the law in six months.
"In an Aug. 9 decision of the province’s Court of Appeal, Chief Justice Michael Tulloch and justices Jonathon George and Patrick Monahan said the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms 'guarantees everyone the right to be secure against unreasonable searches.'.... [O]ne section of the Customs Act 'offends this basic guarantee.' .. section 99(1)(a) of the act allows border agents to search 'some of the most private information imaginable on the lowest possible standard to justify a search,' based merely on suspicion....
"The charter requires more, Tulloch wrote in the decision. 'A reasonable search in this context requires a reasonable suspicion,' which means the suspicion must be based on facts indicating reasonable possibility officers will find evidence of law violations on the device, the chief justice said.
"I conclude that the law infringes s. 8 of the Charter and is unconstitutional,' Tulloch wrote.... He also said a less restrictive alternative — requiring border agents to rely on facts that show travellers could be violating laws, as opposed to 'good faith purpose' — 'would not jeopardize its mandate.'"
August 9. 2024 - "The widespread claims that Britain has a problem with ‘two-tier policing’ have clearly touched a nerve with the establishment. Earlier this week, ... Mark Rowley, Britain’s most-senior police officer, ... issued a statement claiming that it is ‘complete nonsense’ that police would treat anyone differently according to their race, religion or political leanings.... Almost every major media outlet has carried an article purporting to ‘fact-check’ and ‘debunk’ the claims around two-tier policing.... In some cases, the very same outlets that, until now, have been running near weekly articles on how the police are institutionally or structurally racist, riddled with some ‘-ism’ or ‘-phobia’, proclaim that any suggestion of unfairness in policing is preposterous....
"It is certainly true that some on the online right are overegging the extent of two-tier policing.... But there are some like-for-like comparisons we can make that really do illustrate the problem.... Just two weeks before the race riot in Southport, riots broke out in Harehills, a diverse suburb of Leeds. This was sparked when social services attempted to take a Roma child into care. Yet while the police were out in force in Southport and in other English towns over the past two weeks, in Harehills, the police simply ran away. Rioters then overturned a police car, set fire to a bus and wreaked havoc for the rest of the evening. The police essentially allowed the rioters to tire themselves out... Strikingly, the day after the Harehills unrest, Leeds City Council issued a joint statement with ‘representatives of the Roma community’ praising that community’s contribution to the ‘diversity and richness’ of the area. Might this be a hint that the identity of those rioters was at the forefront of the minds of the authorities?
"What the deniers of two-tier policing miss is that differential treatment for different ethnic groups is an unseemly, but inevitable outgrowth of the system of multiculturalism. From the late 1980s onwards, the British state has increasingly related to its ethnic-minority subjects via self-appointed ‘community leaders’ who, in turn, can have a great deal of influence over police and local-authority decision-making. (Some on the right miss the significance of this, too, by mistaking this institutional set-up for police ‘prejudice’ against whites.)
"We saw this system plainly in action in Birmingham earlier this week, when masked Muslim men were allowed to roam around Bordesley Green with weapons. An LBC journalist was chased away with a metal poll. A Sky News broadcast van had its tires stabbed at. A man was badly beaten outside a pub, leaving him with a lacerated liver. The police knew that large crowds were planning to gather here but they decided not to show up.
"The next day, Emlyn Richards of West Midlands Police explained why. Speaking to Sky News, he said that his officers had met with ‘community leaders’ to ‘understand the style of policing we needed to deliver’. The ‘community’ (ie, Birmingham’s Muslims) ‘were trying to make sure that [this gathering] was policed within themselves’. So that’s okay, then? Some communities are free to ‘police themselves’ and can decide how certain men with weapons should be policed? That sounds an awful lot like two-tier policing to me.
"Perhaps the most egregious examples of two-tier policing relate to the ‘pro-Palestine’ marches that have been held almost weekly since 7 October last year. The Metropolitan Police – usually keen to bundle Londoners into a van for using offensive language – haven’t just been turning a blind eye to much of the rank anti-Semitism on the streets.... Back in October, members of Hizb ut-Tahrir – now a proscribed terror organisation – gathered outside the Turkish Embassy in London screaming ‘jihad, jihad, jihad’ and calling for ‘Muslim armies’ to invade Israel. In response, the Met put out an extraordinary tweet trying to reassure the public that jihad ‘has multiple meanings’, while chiding those who associate it ‘with terrorism’. In this instance, the police didn’t just turn a blind eye to this call for terroristic violence and war, they were effectively doing the Islamists’ PR for them.
"Meanwhile, the Met seem to have a zero-tolerance approach towards anything that might cause offence to Islamists and anti-Semites. Niyak Ghorbani, an exiled Iranian dissident, has been arrested on multiple occasions for holding up a sign that accurately describes Hamas – the anti-Semitic terror group behind the 7 October massacre – as ‘terrorists’.... Similarly, last year, volunteers for the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism were threatened with arrest for a ‘breach of the peace’ over a mobile billboard displaying images of the children who had been kidnapped by Hamas. Police officers have even been photographed tearing down posters of Israeli hostages. The excuse for this anti-Semitic vandalism? To calm ‘community tensions’....
"[N]one of these obvious and unambiguous examples of policing double standards feature in the many media ‘debunkings’ of the ‘two-tier-policing myth’. Not for the first time, the ‘fact-checkers’ are less interested in establishing the truth than in defending the establishment narrative. Let’s be frank, two-tier policing is not only real – it is also impossible for any honest person to ignore."
August 8, 2024 - "We were surprised but encouraged to learn a small group of New Brunswickers have founded a local branch of the Libertarian party – committed to ideas such as free markets, smaller government and personal liberty. That’s not to say we endorse the Libertarians for office. Indeed, there is little likelihood ... the new party will come close to earning any seats in the provincial legislature in this fall’s election.
Still, theirs is a point of view that’s a welcome addition to a healthy mix of public policy perspectives. Too often, the sheer size of government and the depth of its involvement in the economy is taken for granted.... We’re under no illusion government is about to take a gigantic retreat – especially with a federal regime that actively pushes the provinces toward more tax-funded projects. But it’s worth more asking ourselves, constantly, whether we ought to be so reliant on government spending and other policy initiatives to solve problems.
"It’s also a necessary balance on the political right. Under Blaine Higgs, the Progressive Conservatives have become more socially conservative. That’s a legitimate point of view, but not one all right-of-centre voters are eager to support.
"The Libertarians are by no means right about everything. But they have a coherent worldview that deserves a voice in our debates. Let’s hope they rise to the challenge."
Social media platform X and video-sharing platform Rumble are suing the World Federation Advertisers (WFA), alleging that the WFA's Global Alliance for a Responsible Media initiative was an illegal conspiracy to restrain trade.
August 6, 2024 – "Rumble (NASDAQ:RUM), the video-sharing platform and cloud services provider, announced that it has joined the social media platform X to file antitrust lawsuits alleging a conspiracy to withhold advertising revenue from Rumble and other digital media platforms. In its filing in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Rumble named as defendants the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), as well as the advertising agency WPP and its subsidiary GroupM Worldwide.
"The conspiracy centers around an initiative called the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), created by the WFA, that established arbitrary standards for the content on digital platforms where its members may want to advertise. GARM used those one-size-fits-all standards to perpetrate an advertiser boycott against Rumble and other platforms.
"The suit also notes that GARM has vast reach since it counts the six largest ad agency holding companies among its members, including defendant WPP....
"The unlawful conduct alleged by Rumble is also the subject of an ongoing investigation by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee in Congress. An interim committee staff report issued in July found that the way GARM has operated in this regard 'is likely illegal under the antitrust laws and threatens fundamental American freedoms.'
"Rumble is seeking a declaration that the defendants’ conduct is illegal, a permanent injunction against the continued conduct, damages, interest, and legal fees, among other relief....
"Rumble is a high-growth video platform and cloud services provider that is creating an independent infrastructure. Rumble’s mission is to restore the internet to its roots by making it free and open once again. For more information, visit: corp.rumble.com."
Canada's immigration minister says that the Trudeau government has no plans to give permanent residency to illegal immigrants in general, but is exploring doing so in certain key sectors of the economy.
August 3, 2024 - "Immigration Minister Marc Miller confirmed that the government has no plans to give residential status to illegal immigrants in Canada. The Trudeau government had initially planned to 'explore ways of regularizing status for undocumented workers who are contributing to Canadian communities' in 2021 but are now acknowledging that it’s not a desire for most citizens.
“'As frustrating as that is to hear for people that are in a precarious position of being undocumented in Canada and are contributing to the economy — and perhaps kids that are Canadian — I think we have to be quite clear with Canadians and quite realistic about what’s achievable,' Miller told CBC News.... 'Canadians are not there and that’s just reality'.... The Immigration Department estimates that there are approximately 300,000 to 600,000 illegal immigrants currently residing in Canada.
"Immigration lawyer Sergo Karas said that the government must first get a handle on how many undocumented migrants are in Canada before it can begin discussing issuing statuses.
The government has no idea how many undocumented migrants are in Canada, so the discussion about granting them status outside the regular immigration process is premature.... Many of the people illegally in Canada are failed refugee claimants who have gone underground, overstaying visitors, and foreign students whose permits came to an end and were unable to apply for permanent residency.
"Karas agreed with the government’s latest stance, saying that granting them amnesty would be an 'affront to the millions of immigrants who followed the law and paid their dues.... It is also an invitation to others to flaunt deportation and removal orders to bide their time and wait for the next amnesty. It is bad policy,' he said.
"Ottawa pledged to reduce the number of temporary residents from its current share of 6.2% of the population to 5% by 2027. 'I think we have to be quite practical and realistic about whether we can achieve that in a way that demonstrates to Canadians that we’re capable of doing that in the next year,' said Miller....
"Miller said that he was still 'actively considering' making status exemptions for migrants working in sectors like healthcare and construction, which are facing desperate labour shortages. However, Karas said reviewing illegal immigrants for certain sectors would ... lead to a further expansion of Canada’s immigration bureaucracy and divert resources from other 'worthy immigration programs.' He said that the 'cost would be staggering' considering the 'Liberals already expanded' the program 'by 42% since the pandemic.'
"Karas also noted that granting residency to certain sectors may open the door for those looking to exploit such exceptions.... 'It will open Pandora’s Box for unscrupulous individuals to “create jobs” for their friends and relatives and will spur a cottage industry where people will be willing to pay for employer confirmation letters and the like. It will become a nightmare.'”
