FINA Committee Report

CPC Dissenting Report

FINA Study of the Emergencies Act and related measures 

June 13, 2022

Discussion 

The emergency study conducted by the Standing Committee on Finance (FINA) on the invocation of the Emergencies Act (the Act) and related measures regarding the 2022 Freedom Convoy clearly demonstrated that the financial measures applied pursuant to the Act, were not necessary to clear the blockades. In addition, the government already had all the necessary tools and powers under current Canadian law, including the Criminal Code of Canada and the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act, to respond effectively. The government has made claims that the use of the Emergencies Act were required to respond. In the case of this study the use of financial tools that required no court order oversight. Extraordinary claims merit extraordinary evidence. During testimony neither government, law enforcement, nor witnesses made a compelling case that the situation in Ottawa required the holus-bolus overriding of Canadian’s Charter Rights from unreasonable search and seizure were in order.

As confirmed by Barry MacKillop of Fintrac, the authorities had no evidence of “terrorist” or insurrection movements associated with the convoy. The unnecessary invocation of the Act infringed on Canadians’ rights through the freezing of bank accounts. Although only a limited number of accounts were frozen, the invocation gave the government power to unilaterally freeze the bank accounts of Canadians for even modest and indirect support of the Freedom Convoy. This is a dangerous precedent and should trouble all Canadians.

Of particular concern is the fact that media reports now suggest that, as Freedom Convoy events were playing out in Ottawa and across Canada, the NDP and the Liberals were already secretly negotiating a backroom deal to form an unofficial coalition, which likely prompted the NDP’s support of the triggering of the Emergencies Act by the Prime Minister. It now appears that the invocation of the Act became the first act of the NDP-Liberal government, even before the tabling of the recent coalition budget.  

It has become very clear that the majority of recommendations from the Liberal members of the Committee are designed to re-affirm the government’s actions in triggering the Emergencies Act. This is under circumstances in which tools already available to the government to respond effectively to the Freedom Convoy were disregarded. 

In summation, due to the fact that A) There were no restrictions put on financial institutions on how they can use the information received, B) The order drafted was incredibly broad and gave institutions the power to circumvent due process, and C)  Accounts could already be frozen using existing means. It is clear that the Emergencies Act was not needed and was unjustifiably utilized.

For those reasons and more, (except for the one recommendation set out below), Conservative members of the committee have declined to put forward their own recommendations, given the lack of opportunity to deliver a consensus report on these consultations. 

Conservatives cannot support the recommendations in this report and are calling for a complete review and update of the Emergencies Act, which is more than 30 years old and was inappropriately invoked to address the Ottawa blockade.