Daily Archives: July 13, 2010

A Commentary by Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper

Over the first week of this July, Niagara At Large experienced an unprecedented number of hits on this fledgling news and commentary site – close to 40,000 in a span of two days – for a story we posted first on a Thorold, Ontario amputee, John Pruyn, who was attending a peaceful rally during the G20 summit on the lawns of the provincial legislature at Queen’s Park in Toronto.

Toronto during G20 summit - 'This ain't Canada right now'.

The 57-year-old federal employee and part-time farmer says he could not maneuver his one good leg and walking sticks fast enough for police lines sweeping in on the Queen’s Park lawns and ordering people who had attended the rally to  “move.” So in short order, he had his artificial leg ripped off by riot police, had his hands tied behind his back and was held in detention for 27 hours before he was finally let go without charges.

While in detention, he was never read his rights and was not allowed to make a phone call to a lawyer or member of his family. Instead, he and other detainees were kept with their hands tied behind their backs, making it hard to perform the most simple of functions like going to the bathroom. In other words, they were afforded fewer rights than those enjoyed by notorious killers like Paul Bernardo and Clifford Olsen when they were taken into custody.

Indeed, as one security cop was heard saying in a video to a group of young people who were questioning why their backpacks should be searched by police before they could walk further down the roads of Toronto; “This ain’t Canada right now.” Continue reading →

 By Randy Hillier, Ontario Conservative Party MPP

(Niagara At Large is posting the following commentary on concerns around G20 security operations by a Conservative MPP and contender last year for his party’s leadership. This site will be pleased to post other commentary by our provincial representatives on this important subject.)

It has been said that in war, truth is the first casualty. Yet in the wake of the Toronto G20 summit, it is clear that truth is an unwelcome intruder within the realm of politics as well.

Ontario Conservative MPP Randy Hillier

Call it my inherent cynicism about politics or maybe put it down to my observation and experience, but the discussion and media coverage surrounding the G20 summit has been ignorant at best, or deliberately misleading at worst. The facts are clear when the political spin is replaced by reasoned evaluation.

The truth is that Dalton McGuinty arbitrarily suspended and abrogated our most sacred civil liberties — our freedoms and privacy — without discussion, debate or public awareness. The premier then justified this abuse of power by asserting that we needed law and order instead. Instead of choosing a more controlled and less populated location that would not be such a powerful magnet for the few juvenile anarchists, Stephen Harper agreed to host the G20 in a location that he had to have known would draw the greatest opposition and most violent response, therefore justifying an outrageous expenditure of public dollars and creating an army of police equipped with a siege mentality. Continue reading →