[The Canadian “justice” system is broken. Peaceful dissidents like Tamara Lich, one of the leaders of the Truckers’ Freedom Convoy faced a minor charge — “counselling mischief.” Yet, the vengeful judicial system, increasingly politicized, denied her bail for 57 days and then imposed draconian conditions. She’s gagged: she not allowed to go on social media or comment publicly on protests against COVID restrictions. Contrast her situation to accused Red Chinese spy Yuesheng Wang . He’s accused of stealing technical information from Hydro Quebec and passing it on to Red China. He’s a Chinese national with a work permit in Canada. Yet, he gets kid glove treatment from the courts. He gets bail, with the condition that he surrender his Chinese passport and keep his cellphone on him so that police can know his whereabouts. A kid could explain how he might flee. His Red Chinese spymasters (if he is, indeed, a spy) can easily reissue him a new passport and he could leave his phone at home and be ought of the country in a few hours. It’s a sick joke. Peacefully protest our woke government’s policies and the system want to keep you in jail. As a foreigner, steal Canadian technical secrets and you’re good to go. — Paul Fromm]
Alleged Chinese spy in Quebec freed on bail ahead of trial
Updated Nov. 28, 2022 4:41 p.m. EST Published Nov. 28, 2022 10:50 a.m. EST Share
Longueuil, Que. –
A former employee of Quebec’s power utility who is charged with spying on behalf of China was granted bail Monday, after a judge said the accused was more likely than not to stay in Canada awaiting trial.
Yuesheng Wang, 35, is the first person to be charged with economic espionage under Canada’s Security of Information Act. He also faces three charges under the Criminal Code: fraudulently using a computer, fraudulently obtaining a trade secret and breach of trust.
Federal prosecutors opposed his release because they felt he was a flight risk. But Quebec court Judge Marco LaBrie said detention pending trial wasn’t necessary because of the “serious guarantees” that Wang offered as a condition of release.
“Zero-risk doesn’t exist, but the court is convinced the probability is much more likely that Mr. Wang will remain in Canada and present himself for his trial,” LaBrie said, as Wang listened to a translation in Mandarin.
Wang agreed to surrender his Chinese passport, carry a cellphone at all times so police can use GPS to geolocate him, and put up his two properties as a guarantee. Wang must also check in weekly at RCMP headquarters and is forbidden from contacting the Chinese government — except to seek assistance with his case, and only after the contact is approved by his lawyer.
Wang, a Chinese national living in Canada on a work visa, worked in a specialized centre at Hydro-Quebec that developed technology for electric vehicles and energy-storage systems. He is alleged to have given information about the public corporation to a Chinese university and Chinese research centres, and to have transferred confidential documents and unauthorized photos to his personal email address. Police also allege that Wang used information without his employer’s consent, harming Hydro-Quebec’s intellectual property.
Last week, he took the witness stand during his two-day bail hearing — an unusual move, as most defendants don’t testify to the evidence against them during preliminary court proceedings. Wang denied all the charges and said he wanted to remain in Canada to clear his name.
During his testimony, Wang told the court that the information he is accused of stealing was “open source” and not a trade secret. He added that the photos he had taken of the laboratory were to identify security concerns. He said he had not shared the photos.
The judge said on Monday that there was no evidence presented at the bail hearing to suggest Wang had attempted to flee the country after his Nov. 14 arrest and his termination from Hydro-Quebec. He had been under RCMP surveillance for more than a month before he was charged.
Federal prosecutor Marc Cigana told reporters after the ruling that the judge’s decision was “legally sound.”
“The judge believed yes, there was a flight risk, but that risk was manageable, and he was able to manage it by imposing those conditions,” Cigana said.
“I respect the judge’s decision and I hope that Mr. Wang will also.”
Defence lawyer Gary Martin said he accepted with humility the judge’s ruling. “There’s still a lot of work to be done, many things that are still coming from the Crown,” Martin said. “I’m sure there’s more reports, more evidence, more surveillance tapes. We’ll have to work with that and get this case ready for a trial.”
Wang’s girlfriend, Yunfeng Zheng, put up $1,000 as part of his bail conditions. “Personally, I don’t think he’ll run away … I trust him very much,” Zheng told reporters.
The resident of Candiac, Que., will remain detained until a notary draws up a court-ordered mortgage for his properties. The case will return to court on Dec. 13.
Trudeau Did Not Have Authority to Invoke the Emergencies Act – Canadian Constitutional Foundation (CCF)’s Closing Argument http://cafe.nfshost.com/?p=8316
Trudeau Did Not Have Authority to Invoke the Emergencies Act – CCF Closing Argument
Chinese Lockdown Protests Intensify In Rare Display Of Defiance
I hope these brave freedom fighters experience the exhilaration and fellowship that we did in Canada during the End the Lockdown rallies.
Red Chinahas imposed severe and egregious COVID lockdowns where people cannot hardly leave home. . There has always been protests in China but this many spreading across China at the same time is a little bit different. It’s being compared to Tiananmen Square in 1989.
I have yet to hear the term “China Spring” so, at this time anyway, I don’t think it is the neocons at Foggy Bottom doing this. At the bottom of this email I included an article of WEF founder Klaus Schwab, a Jew, stating that the Chinese communist system is the preferred system and with these recent protests coming out to the public, it helps to reveal HIS real motivations as a globalist. With these protests the Chinese people are rejecting not just the lockdowns but the central government itself.
How it all turns out, it’s hard to say at present. Is this meant to deter President Xi from moving on Taiwan or to encourage it in a Sino “wag the dog” moment.
______________________
to Alan
So China has imposed severe and egregious covid lock downs where people cannot hardly leave home. Why, I’m not sure unless the “conspiracy theory” is true and that there are some “white hats” of some kind, Xi’s own people perhaps, that want to bring down the CCP in China but they need the help of the people to do so and one way is to make life so unbearable that the people have to rise up. There has always been protests in China but this many spreading across China at the same time is a little bit different. Not organic, but organized. Being compared to Tiananmen Square in 1989.
I have yet to hear the term “China Spring” so, at this time anyway, I don’t think it is the neocons at Foggy Bottom doing this. At the bottom of this email I included an article of WEF founder Klaus Schwab, stating that the Chinese communist system is the preferred system and with these recent protests coming out to the public, it helps to reveal HIS real motivations as a globalist. With these protests the Chinese people are rejecting not just the lockdowns but the central government itself. How it all turns out, it’s hard to say at present. Is this meant to deter President Xi from moving on Taiwan or to encourage it in a Sino “wag the dog” moment.
The Mask Is Off: WEF’s Klaus Schwab Declares China A “Role Model”
Once upon a time, the Soviets had a tightly controlled network of internationalists known as the COMINTERN to promote their communist model to Europe and beyond.
As it stands now, the Red Chinese have gone them one better: They’ve got Klaus Schwab.
World Economic Forum founder and Chair Klaus Schwab recently sat down for an interview with a Chinese state media outlet and proclaimed that China was a “role model” for other nations.
Schwab, 84, made these comments during an interview with CGTN’s Tian Wei on the sidelines of last week’s APEC CEO Summit in Bangkok, Thailand. Schwab said he respected China’s “tremendous” achievements at modernizing its economy over the last 40 years.
“I think it’s a role model for many countries,” Schwab said, before qualifying that he thinks each country should make its own decisions about what system it wants to adapt. “I think we should be very careful in imposing systems. But the Chinese model is certainly a very attractive model for quite a number of countries,” Schwab said.
ADL Demands that Elon Musk Remove “Denizens of Hell”
Jonathan Greenblatt heads ADL, a militantly anti-free speech lobby. On CNN, today he demanded that Elon Musk remove “the denizens of hell”; that is, nationalists and critics of Jews. Get this straight: Groups like ADL &, in Canada, the Canada Israel Affairs Committee are the worst enemies of free speech.
[This blows my mind. I am loving what Elon Musk is doing. This is fantastic. The heads of the Liberals/Jews/Leftists/Communists must be EXPLODING. This is fantastic. I wonder if they have records of really old Twitter accounts like mine which were banned 7 years ago? This is a HUGE step in the right direction. Musk is doing better work than Trump. Seriously. This is HUGE. This is HUGE. I’m very impressed. Jan Lamprecht]
Twitter’s new boss Elon Musk has announced he is rolling out a blanket amnesty for accounts that were permanently suspended on his recently acquired social media platform.
Earlier this week, Musk ran a poll to ask Twitter users if they’d support such an amnesty.
“Should Twitter offer a general amnesty to suspended accounts, provided that they have not broken the law or engaged in egregious spam?” he wrote.
More than three million users voted in the poll, with nearly three-quarters of voters, 72.4%, voting “yes,” while just 27.6% voted “no.”
After an overwhelming number of users voted in favor of the idea, Musk announced that he will begin rolling out the amnesty next week.
He revealed that Twitter will begin unbanning accounts en masse, except for those who broke the law or engaged in excessive spam.
“The people have spoken,” Musk wrote after the poll concluded.
“Amnesty begins next week. Vox Populi, Vox Dei.” Musk has already unbanned a number of popular accounts that were permanently suspended before he took over as “Chief Twit.”
Before the poll ended, Musk seemed to indicate that in effect, the platform would significantly curtail content moderation to target illegal content and increase transparency.
“Please limit content moderation to illegal content (or, at most, a narrow interpretation of moderation under Section 230) and give users the tools that enable the freedom to choose what content they see,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton replied to the poll.
“That’s the general idea,” Musk replied.
“[W]hatever it decides to do, twitter should be clear and consistent about it’s rules and penalties for breaking them, enforcement should be unbiased, and the mechanisms of enforcement shouldn’t be easily abused by people who have an agenda,” Billy Markus, the creator of DogeCoin, replied to the poll.
Musk agreed with Markus’s suggestion, replying with the “100” and “bullseye” emojis.
In a separate tweet, Musk indicated that Twitter’s old policies and enforcement methods were dishonest.
“The more I learn, the worse it gets,” Musk said.
“The world should know the truth of what has been happening at Twitter.
“Transparency will earn the trust of the people.”
Twitter’s blanket amnesty policy is Musk’s latest move in his effort to restore free speech on the social media giant.
Under his leadership, Twitter has already restored the accounts of several high-profile conservative and right-leaning influencers.
The list includes Christian satire site The Babylon Bee; renowned clinical psychologist Dr. Jordan Peterson; conservative undercover investigative journalism outfit Project Veritas; and President Donald Trump.
As Slay News reported, Musk announced earlier this week that he plans to publish all of Twitter’s internal discussions regarding the company’s decision to block the Hunter Biden laptop story in the run-up to the 2020 election.
“This is necessary to restore public trust,” he said of the move.
Dans toute la France, des militants et sympathisants du CLAN et des Nationalistes ont affiché leur soutien à Vincent Reynouard.
L’historien spécialiste du national-socialisme allemand est persécuté depuis des années en raison de ses travaux historiques qui remettent en causes les conclusions du tribunal militaire international de Nuremberg. Il est actuellement en détention provisoire en Ecosse où il est en attente de sa probable extradition vers la France.
Nous exigeons sa libération immédiate, la fin des poursuites à son encontre, et la liberté de recherche pour tous les historiens.
Throughout France, activists and sympathizers of the CLAN and the Nationalists showed their support for Vincent Reynouard.
The historian specializing in German National Socialism has been persecuted for years because of his historical work which calls into question the conclusions of the international military tribunal in Nuremberg. He is currently in pre-trial detention in Scotland where he is awaiting his probable extradition to France.
We demand his immediate release, an end to the charges against him, and freedom of research for all historians.
Each week in Rivarol, we will have a thought for Vincent Reynouard, regretting the silence of most media about him.
For 30 years, his total commitment to the Truth has not been without consequences on his mental state and his personal life, which is complex in fact.
Whatever his mistakes, with his family or with us, he remains a hero to be supported and not forgotten.
Attached is the drawing for this week as well as the address where to write to him in prison.
Chaque semaine dans Rivarol, nous aurons une pensée pour Vincent Reynouard, regrettant le silence de la plupart des médias à son sujet.
Depuis 30 ans, son engagement total pour la Vérité n’a pas été sans conséquences sur son état mental et sa vie personnelle, complexe de fait.
Quelles qu’aient été ses erreurs, avec sa famille ou avec nous, il reste un héros à soutenir et à ne pas oublier.
Ci-joint le dessin pour cette semaine ainsi que l’adresse où lui écrire en prison.
BC Government Trickery Passes Bills with No Time for Discussion
· Bill 36 (BC) – (Medical Professions and Occupations Act) and Bill 44 (Building and Strata Statures Amendment Act) were both passed in the BC Legislature last week, after the government called a one-week pause, prior to intruding these two acts and others this past week and calling for immediate Closure. No time for the opposition to even read and comment on these contentious bills, and no time allowed for the normal discussion in the legislature.
· Thank you to those who wrote their MLAs to try and prevent this. The majority party ruled with an iron fist.
· Stay tuned to our weekly emails for further actions as they become available.
——————————- o0o————————————-LAST MINUTE REMINDER – SAVE 75% on Tuttle Twins Books!Place your order by 8 p.m. TONIGHT! That’s TONIGHT BY 8 P.M. TO BE SURE OF 75% DISCOUNTS.Freedom-oriented Books for Kids and Teens – 75% off on two major bundles. One for elementary-level readers, and one which includes the entire Tuttle Twins product line, including pre-school, elementary, and teens (all the series), teacher guides, curricula, and more. TuttleTwins.com>>>>USE THIS LINK https://tuttletwins.com/bf/instead of the link sent in an earlier email. <<<<CALL MARY LOU IF YOU NEED HELP ORDERING! 780-908-0309——————————- o0o————————————-This Sunday, November 27th – from 1 to 3 p.m. Corner of Main and Warren, Penticton.Show up! Speak up! Open Mic. Lots happening locally and Canada-wide.
Miss a week, miss a lot! Fighting for freedom is more fun with friends. Bring a few. Bring signs.——————————- o0o————————————- OTHER REGULAR RALLIES · Kelowna CLEAR Rallies – every Saturday at noon – Stuart Park, Kelowna · Oliver – in front of city hall – Saturdays at 12:30 p.m. · Penticton – Tuesdays at noon, in front of Richard Cannings’ Office – 301 Main Street
——————————- o0o————————————-
NATIONAL CITIZENS-LED INQUIRY – Sign the Petition, and spread the word.
Canada’s federal, provincial, and municipal governments’ responses to COVID-19 were of an unprecedented nature. The magnitude of these interventions demands a comprehensive, transparent, and objective inquiry into the appropriateness and efficacy of the measures imposed.
National Citizens’ Inquiry – Keep the Momentum Going Take Action HERE
· Sign the petition – Currently 37,000 signatures, goal is to reach over 100,000 ASAP for upcoming announcements. · Nominate a Commissioner · Volunteer if you so choose.
——————————- o0o————————————-
Remember that Freedom Hugs are available at ALL our Penticton4Freedom events!
Madrid prosecutors aim to jail Isabel Peralta, H&D’s European correspondent, for her comments at a demonstration last year.
Isabel Peralta – European correspondent of H&Dwho recently addressed our meeting in Preston – is in court this week in Madrid, where the authorities aim to jail her for three years.
The case has been brought under Spain’s equivalent of the UK’s racial incitement laws, but as our assistant editor Peter Rushton explains in this article, Isabel is being targeted in blatant political machinations: not only by the Spanish government, but also by lobbyists working in the interests of the Moroccan government.
For this and other reasons which we shall disclose in a later article, the prosecution of Isabel Peralta is a disgrace to Spanish justice. If she is convicted, the matter will be appealed if necessary as far as the European Court. Spanish politicians and Moroccan lobbyists are the true criminals, working against the interests of Spain and against the interests of Europeans.
Isabel Peralta addressing H&D’s event in Preston a few weeks ago
The case dates back to 18th May 2021, when a demonstration was held outside the Moroccan Embassy in Madrid by a Spanish nationalist youth group. Isabel was at the time a leading activist in this group.
In an interview and speech, both of which were later broadcast on YouTube, Isabel explained the purpose of this demonstration: to draw attention to the attempted blackmail being exerted by the Moroccan Government, who were threatening to flood Spain with immigrants unless Spain accepted Moroccan control over Western Sahara.
This is a diplomatic dispute that has been going on for more than half a century, ever since Spain gave up its colonial control over the province once known as Spanish Sahara. Morocco seeks to grab the entire area for itself, but is opposed by an independence movement called Polisario Front, which is backed by Algeria.
It is in Spaniards’ economic interest to back the Polisario, partly in order to remain on good terms with Algeria, which supplies Spain with natural gas. But for the past two years the Moroccan government has exerted blackmail on Spain.
Spain’s shameless Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez being entertained by leading politicians in Morocco in April 2022 after his government’s surrender to Moroccan blackmail.
Morocco’s main weapon is control over illegal immigration into Spanish territory. They have indicated that they are prepared to turn the immigration tap on or off. And Spain’s socialist government is naturally unable or unwilling to take firm action against the consequent flood, just as it fails to resist mass immigration from elsewhere.
Essentially this was the background to the demonstration addressed by Isabel Peralta in Madrid in May last year. The demonstration targeted both the Moroccan government’s blackmail, and the Spanish authorities’ weakness.
Isabel’s interview and speech was making a serious and well-informed case. She explained that the demonstrators had come to the Embassy “to stand up to the indecency of our politicians who look the other way, while we suffer unprecedented racial replacement”.
She emphasised that “the problem here is not Morocco. The problem is what purports to be our own government, which with impunity sets off this explosion: the arrival of immigrants on a massive scale.”
Since politicians were not prepared to stand up to the Moroccan government’s blackmail, Spanish nationalist youth had to come forward. Isabel concluded her interview with words that require some explanation to British readers: “We shall not allow another Green March.”
Moroccan invaders on the ‘Green March’ in November 1975
The Green March – on 6th November 1975 – was the deliberate incursion by 350,000 Moroccans (organised by their government) into what was still Spanish colonial territory, in what is now Western Sahara. Because Spain was beginning its decolonisation, its soldiers were ordered not to open fire and to accept what was essentially an invasion.
So the Green March was a Spanish surrender, abandoning their responsibility to their former colonial subjects. Spain signed the so-called Madrid Accords, which effectively rewarded Morocco for their illegal invasion. (Part of the problem was that this was happening during the last weeks of General Franco’s life: he was dying and incapable of exercising any political authority.)
During her speech to the rally outside the Moroccan Embassy, Isabel picked up the theme that had concluded her interview: “Now as in 1975, they are trying again and they are coming with force, and 5,000 now seems like a lot to us, but in ten years they will seem like few, because if we do not stop them this will be our future: immigration in Europe will supplant our race, our diversity, our religion and our culture, and we are the only ones who are going to fight for it.”
The context is very clear: Isabel is correctly comparing the surrender in 1975, when the Spanish government gave in to Moroccan invaders and betrayed the indigenous people of Western Sahara, to the potential surrender in 2021-2022, when today’s Spanish government is similarly weak in the face of Moroccan threats.
Isabel addressing the Embassy rally in May 2021. Her accurate analysis of Spain’s surrender to Moroccan blackmail has resulted in Isabel herself – not treacherous politicians and lobbyists – facing trial!
It turned out that Isabel was absolutely correct. Not only has the Madrid government continued to allow floods of immigrants, it has also surrendered to Morocco’s blackmail. In March 2022, almost a year after Isabel’s comments, Spain’s socialist government carried out a U-turn and adopted a pro-Moroccan position, abandoning the decades-long Spanish policy that Western Sahara’s future should be settled by a referendum of its inhabitants.
The U-turn threatens vital trade deals including the supply of natural gas from Algeria.
The entire situation is a shambles, rooted in the inability of Spain’s socialist government to stand up for Spanish interests.
As so often across the West, when the arguments of nationalists are vindicated, the authorities’ response is to persecute us. And as so often, weakness in the face of an invader or a blackmailer merely invites further invasion and further blackmail.
This time it is our correspondent Isabel Peralta who is on the frontline. As they prepared their surrender to Morocco, the Spanish authorities launched a prosecution of Isabel, which has come to court in Madrid this week. Prosecutors are asking for her to be jailed for up to three years.
In presenting her interview and speech as inciting racial violence, prosecutors have deliberately ignored its political context. They have not only deliberately distorted her speech, they have even omitted crucial words from the transcript. Isabel clearly said that the demonstration was anti-immigration, but not motivated by hatred of any race. Such hatred, she emphasised, would be absurd since our entire political outlook is based on recognition of racial differences. We are motivated, she pointed out, “by admiration and devotion to our own race in the face of a threat to its very existence”.
The political manipulation at the heart of this case is obvious from official papers that I have examined.
Mohammed Chaib (above, third left) at an official Moroccan event with his good friend Karima Benyaïch, the Moroccan Ambassador to Madrid, plus socialist MP Ricardo Garcia and Spain’s honorary consul in Morocco, Khadija El Gabsi. Chaib has extensive Moroccan business interests – an employee of his foundation brought the only criminal complaint against Isabel’s speech.
Ten days after the demonstration, Madrid’s political police were visited by Sofia Bencrimo, an employee of a charity that promotes the integration of immigrants. Later the same day these police officers sent a report to the prosecutors: this was the first step in the process leading to Isabel’s criminal trial.
The political police (duly followed by prosecutors) presented Ms Bencrimo’s complaint against Isabel as though it reflected a charity standing up for ordinary immigrants who felt threatened by Isabel’s words. In the entire prosecution dossier of more than 90 pages, which I have studied in detail, Ms Bencrimo’s is the only complaint from anyone outside Spanish officialdom.
Yet the organisation this complainant represented – the Ibn Battuta Foundation – is not as simple as police and prosecutors pretend.
Its president is Mohammed Chaib Akhdim, a veteran politician and businessman with close personal and financial ties to the Moroccan government – the very people whose actions were being exposed and criticised in Isabel’s speech.
Chaib is a former MP in both the Catalan and Madrid parliaments for the left-wing party PSC (Socialists Party of Catalonia). But he is also a wealthy businessman with financial interests in his native Morocco, and in particular stands to benefit from Morocco taking control of Western Sahara. Since 1992 he was been director of business development in Morocco for COMSA Industrial, a company with vast interests in engineering and construction projects in Morocco, including the disputed territory of Western Sahara.
Mohammed Chaib (second left) with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez. Chaib’s business will profit greatly from Sánchez’s surrender to Morocco over Western Sahara; meanwhile the politicised Spanish police prosecute Isabel Peralta for drawing attention to the treachery of Sánchez’s government. An employee of Chaib’s foundation brought the complaint that facilitated this prosecution.
It is a remarkable coincidence that the “charity worker” who brought the complaint against Isabel Peralta was an employee of Chaib’s foundation.
H&D fully supports our brave and brilliant comrade Isabel. We look forward to her victory over this politically motivated prosecution – however long that victory takes.
Jamie Sarkonak: Jon Kay’s legal victory exposes Canadian Anti-Hate Network’s anti-conservative agenda
(National Post, November 24, 2022)
T
This is a politically motivated group that has no qualms about accusing mainstream conservatives of being racist and using the legal system to try to silence them.
A recent decision by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice has given Canadians yet another reason to question the federal government’s relationship with the Canadian Anti-Hate Network (CAHN),
On Nov. 10, the court dismissed a defamation lawsuit launched by lawyer Richard Warman, also a board member of CAHN. Warman sued journalists Jonathan and Barbara Kay for tweets that criticized CAHN’s links to the Antifa movement in the United States, which has been covered by C2C Journal and The Federalist (the Kays did not name Warman himself in their tweets). In the end, the judge ruled that the tweets weren’t defamatory, which meant the Kays wouldn’t be liable.
Even if the tweets did meet the legal threshold to be considered defamatory, the Kays would have been saved by the legal defences available. The judge said that the statements made had the benefit of being true, noting that, “CAHN did in fact assist Antifa and that the movement has been violent,” and it would be reasonable to state that it is not a “good look” for a human rights organization to support a violent movement.
Additionally, the judge concluded the defence of fair comment could apply, meaning the opinions expressed by the Kays could be reasonably drawn from the known facts and were not expressed out of malice. The judge noted that even “Warman’s evidence was that he and CAHN were part of the Antifa movement,” and its “muscular resistance” and “physical disruption” were known to two other board members.
The decision tells us two things: that there are members of CAHN who are willing to use the legal system to silence its critics, and that there is a relationship between CAHN and the Antifa movement. It’s yet another indicator that the Government of Canada — particularly the Department of Canadian Heritage — should distance itself from the organization.
CAHN has received government funding in the past, including a grant of $268,400 to participate in an “anti-racism action program” from October 2020 to March 2022. The grant agreement, obtained through an access to information request, shows that the money was used to hire additional staff members, facilitate workshops, write articles about hate groups (CAHN covers everyone from far-right neo-nazis to conservative-leaning school board candidates) and engage on social media.
A “recommendation for ministerial approval” form (also obtained through an access to information request), which is used by bureaucrats to review the grant application prior to its approval, described the expected outcomes: “This project will increase the organization’s capacity to counter online hate by hiring four team members to carry out the monitoring of extreme-right groups, report on their activities and file complaints with law enforcement; it will educate the public as to these groups and the damage they create, and will share information through 10,000 Facebook and Twitter followers.”
Reporting citizens to police wasn’t an expectation written into the final grant agreement, but it’s concerning that paying a third-party group to investigate people for the purpose of initiating criminal investigations was on the table in the first place.
On top of that, CAHN has advised the government on numerous occasions. Records from an access to information request show that it was listed as a Canadian Heritage stakeholder on the Public Health Agency of Canada’s vaccine roll-out round-table. That was in January 2021, a month after CAHN signed its contract with the federal government.
In March 2022 — the month the government grant was set to expire — Canadian Heritage created an advisory group to help it craft its online censorship legislation. Among the appointees was Bernie Farber, chair of the CAHN. (Months before he was named to the panel, Farber told the CBC that when it comes to internet regulation, “I would rather have poorly worded legislation than nothing at all.”) The panellists could be paid a maximum of $27,000 for their work.
The panel made a number of recommendations for an online censorship regime, one of which was public education: specifically, the implementation of “programs to improve media literacy and developing a concept of e-citizenship through outreach programs in schools and communities.”
The recommendations were released on June 15, 2022. A couple weeks later, the Government of Canada and CAHN launched an “anti-hate toolkit” for use in schools — a project that was supported by the Canadian Heritage grant. The toolkit’s focus was on far-right radicalization (it should be noted that far-left radicalization and Islamic radicalization, which have also been problems in Canada, were not mentioned in it).
Among other things, the toolkit outlined problematic behaviours in students that should be reported to teachers and corrected, including displaying the Red Ensign (Canada’s former flag), the use of various memes and supporting unsavoury politicians like former U.S. president Donald Trump.
The toolkit is very much a political document that primarily targets the far-right. But in doing so, it goes after mild traditionalism, classical liberal stances on social policy and mainstream conservative values, as well.
Despite the fact the organization was only just incorporated in 2018, members of CAHN have appeared before parliamentary committees multiple times since 2019, often to discuss social policy and public safety. Its members also often appear in the media as independent “experts” on the subject hate.
This is a politically motivated group that is now recognized by a court to be associated with Antifa, and has no qualms about accusing mainstream conservatives of being racist and using the legal system to try to silence them. It’s free to advocate for whatever it wants, but the federal government shouldn’t be using the group to push fundamentally illiberal views on the limits of free speech in a free and democratic society.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland wanted individuals whose bank accounts had been frozen to be denied their cash until they reported to the police. The suggestion was not ultimately acted upon,
Is Canada becoming an illiberal democracy?
That description is typically associated with developing countries such as India, or recent democracies such as Hungary, where right-of-centre governments are accused by western observers of democratic backsliding and an illiberal turn. It’s ironic, then, that, by some measures, Canada, which we once assumed to be a bastion of liberal democracy, is becoming increasingly illiberal.
Sure, we have a government that is ostensibly centre-left and claims to have a “progressive” and “inclusive” agenda. Yet it was the Liberal government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that invoked highly illiberal emergency powers during peacetime. This had only happened once before, under another Liberal government, led another Trudeau, during the October Crisis of 1970.
You would think that in a country in which many people, certainly many of the elites, profess liberal and progressive values, a lot of them would have been disturbed by last winter’s declaration of an emergency. Police forces acting under government orders broke up a peaceful protest in the nation’s capital, and the bank accounts of many innocent Canadians who participated in, or gave support to, the Freedom Convoy were frozen.
We recently learned through secret cabinet documents that Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland wanted individuals whose bank accounts had been frozen to be denied their cash until they reported to the police. The suggestion was not ultimately acted upon, but was made public in a redacted document shared with the Public Order Emergency Commission.
What is even more alarming is that the major banks were apparently pleased with this suggestion. One financial institution, Farm Credit Canada, a Crown corporation that provides financial services primarily to farms, went so far as to tell its employees to proactively and secretly record the names of customers who they suspected may have been involved with the convoy, according to a Blacklock’s Reporter story based on documents provided through an access to information request. This sounds more like communist East Germany, than India or Hungary.
But it’s not just the liberal elite who seem to be giving up on liberal values in Canada. A recent poll by Innovative Research Group found that 51 per cent of Canadians surveyed said that they supported the use of the Emergencies Act, which is actually up two per cent since February.
This, despite revelations in the ongoing public inquiry, which fell within the polling period, that law enforcement officials at all levels did not believe that there was an imminent threat to Canada’s national security and that the protesters were not violent extremists, which demolishes the government’s stated rationale for its use of the Emergencies Act. It’s more than a little disturbing that more people actually support the emergency declaration after these revelations were made public.
Until not that long ago, Canada was, and was widely seen internationally, as a sane and pragmatic country, where rights and freedoms were protected, and encroached upon only when absolutely necessary, such as in the two world wars. While Pierre Trudeau’s use of emergency powers to round up a small group of separatists in Quebec has been debated, the overreach of all levels of government in dealing with the pandemic has been nothing short of astonishing.
Canada had the toughest restrictions in the advanced world, something that Justin Trudeau himself bragged about, and now, when the rest of the world is moving on, voices in Canada’s “liberal” elite are again fear-mongering and urging for fresh restrictions, such as a return to mandatory masking, with the threat of new vaccine mandates not officially disavowed by the federal government.
It’s noteworthy that much of the advanced world has been moving to the right, most recently Italy and Sweden, but Canada remains in thrall to a government driven by a leftist ideology that is among the most illiberal in the western world. How did the citizens of a country that proclaims itself the “true north strong and free” start accepting life under government diktat and the loss of our individual liberties?
