Independent Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston MPP Randy Hillier has been a part of so many protests over pandemic measures across Ontario that he’s lost count.
And the message he’s bringing to the crowd of roughly 100 people gathered at Bellevue Park Saturday is the same one he’s been putting out there across the province: The lockdowns are causing far more harm and injury to people than the COVID-19 virus itself.
“Because I am so outspoken, people from all across the country, all across the province, contact me about the injustice that they’re facing, about the terror that their kids are experiencing, about the lack of education, about the financial bankruptcy and destruction. The unemployed,” said Hillier, speaking to reporters Saturday. “There is no shortage of people who are being injured, and our political class have turned their back on those that they are injuring.”
Hillier wants to see Ontario strike up a royal commission on the province’s handling of the pandemic.
“We don’t know what the minutes of those meetings are, we don’t know who the attendees of those meetings were. We don’t know what evidence they examined, we don’t know what evidence they didn’t examine,” said Hillier. “Everything that has been determined has been opaque - a royal commission would shine a light into that, to see what was heard and who made what decisions, and what the consequences of those decisions were. The consequences in long-term care, the consequences for people trying to get organ transplants. The many people that we know that have died because of lack of cancer screenings and heart surgeries.”
“All that stuff needs to be understood, so we don’t f*** up again.”
A member of the local media asks what Hillier would’ve done differently in terms of handling the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I would’ve been honest with people, and I would not have scared people. I would not have put people into a panic mode. I would’ve asked them to think and look at the evidence and not just the projections and the modelling,” he replied.
Hillier, who plans on attending a similar protest at Sudbury’s Bell Park Sunday, says that he’s been charged about 20, maybe even 25 times for defying provincial pandemic measures. The majority of those tickets received have been for organizing events.
He’s looking forward to the day when he’s in a court of law.
“I’ll argue the merits of these unconstitutional breaches, and I am confident that any competent judge hearing the evidence will agree that what we have done is unlawful, injurious and unjustified - and those laws will be struck down and nullified,” he said.
Sault Ste. Marie Police Service charged two people - one from Spring Water Township, Ont. and one from Perth, Ont. - under the Reopening Ontario Act for organizing Saturday’s illegal gathering.
A conviction for organizing a gathering will result in a minimum fine of $10,000.
Police say the investigation into the illegal gathering is ongoing.