Elections are important, but they are not the only way to exercise democratic rights. Between trips to the ballot box, citizens participate in democratic life in a variety of ways, including expressing their views on the social and political issues they believe in most.
This expressive activity is the bedrock of a healthy democracy and a frequent agent of social change. It helps hold governments accountable to the people and ensures that the society we want is the one that we get.
When thousands of peaceful protesters sought to express their views during last summer’s G20 Summit in Toronto, the state’s response demonstrated a significant lack of regard for expressive rights. While the vandalism that occurred during the summit was undoubtedly condemnable, it did not give police carte blanche to perform illegal searches, violently disperse peaceful protests, or arrest more than 1,100 people.
Nor did it justify police officers removing their badges, intimidating protesters, or telling citizens that their constitutional rights had been suspended. Peaceful protesters that were on the receiving end of this police conduct may think twice about taking to the street to express their views in the future. This is a loss to our democracy.
How police acted during the G20 exposes significant flaws in police policy and training, as well as a pervasive and troubling lack of respect for peaceful protest rights. These are systemic problems that require systemic solutions.
Canadians deserve to know what went wrong during the G20 and whether it could have been avoided. Sadly, the G20 reviews that are currently under way all suffer from jurisdictional impediments that limit how far they can probe in answering these questions.
No review can, for example, fully examine the interplay between the RCMP and provincial and municipal police services, or assess whether there were across-the-board communications, training or leadership failures that resulted in large-scale rights violations. As a result, many aspects of G20 summit security are likely to remain unexamined.
To remedy this situation, a comprehensive federal-provincial public inquiry is needed. Though an inquiry would add to the already hefty price tag for hosting the G20 summit, the cost of not having an inquiry would be even greater.
If the billion-dollar model employed to secure the G20 becomes the Canadian norm, the erosion of our expressive rights will have significant implications for how our democracy functions. The current election provides an opportunity to remind our representatives that Canadians value our expressive rights and to urge them to support a G20 inquiry.
This is something we should all be willing to raise our voice for.
