On Day 18 of the Truckers for Freedom Convoy, another Liberal MP broke rank with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to criticize the government’s pandemic response, Ontario refused to commit to an end to vaccine passports and mask mandates and truckers in Ottawa, Windsor and Coutts stayed put.
One day after Quebec MP Joel Lightbound spoke out against his government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, Liberal MP Yves Robillard also stepped forward to raise questions about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s response to the pandemic.
“He (Lightbound) said exactly what a lot of us think,” said Robillard in an interview with the Hill Times on Wednesday. “I agree with everything that Lightbound said.”
In Question Period today, Conservative interim leader Candice Bergen took advantage of the growing dissent within the Liberal party, pressing Trudeau about why, rather than unite Canadians, he continues to “stigmatize, divide and wedge.”
As Alberta enjoyed its first day after the lifting of the vaccine passports, governments in Ontario and British Columbia doubled down.
Ontario health minister Christine Elliot said during a press conference today that the Doug Ford government had no plans to lift vaccine passports and mask mandates and would instead stick to a standard, three-phase reopening plan involving capacity limits.
While other provinces were lifting mandates, B.C.’s provincial health officer Bonnie Henry announced that she would be adding to them. Henry said today that the province’s vaccine mandate for healthcare workers would be extended to include dentists, chiropractors and other health practitioners regulated by B.C.’s healthcare colleges.
“It is the vaccine mandate in health care that has made a huge difference in our ability to manage through this wave,” she said Wednesday. “This is going to be a serious respiratory illness that’s going to be with us at least for another year.”
Back in Ottawa, though, protesters continued to show high spirits. Speeches continued, flags were everywhere and plenty of gas cans could be spied among the vehicles – despite the Ottawa police’s confiscation efforts.
The truckers continued to offer plenty of free food to anyone who came by. As True North’s Elie Cantin-Nantel pointed out, those were hardly the actions of terrorists and insurrectionists – as many legacy journalists and left-wing politicians keep labelling the peaceful protesters.
Meanwhile at the Detroit-Windsor border crossing – the busiest in North America – blockades continued as truckers pushed for an end to vaccine mandates and the ongoing erosion of liberties under COVID.
Back in Alberta, the truckers who continued to blockade the Coutts, Alberta border crossing were joined by another protest outside of Milk River, 15 minutes away.
Here, RCMP threatens the blockade with imminent enforcement action.
The Givesendgo in support of the truckers at the time this article was published had reached USD $8,038,866.
