On Mondays, TVO.org provides a primer on what to look for in the coming week in Ontario politics, and features some stories making news now.
Here’s what we’ve got our eye on:
Queen’s Park Keywords
Fully vaccinated: Some experts say the province should stop considering people with two doses of COVID-19 vaccine fully vaccinated for the purposes of gaining entry to restaurants, theatres, and other indoor facilities. "We know that for most people, after the second dose, because of the time since when they got the last dose, immunity has waned pretty substantially and so it's not nearly as protective as it was," infectious disease physician Andrew Morris told CBC News. Both NDP Leader Andrea Horwath and Liberal Leader Steven Del Duca are in favour of requiring people to have three doses to qualify for a vaccine certificate, but Premier Doug Ford has said it’s not something the government is considering at this time.
Krista:Premier Ford’s eldest daughter, Krista Haynes, joined crowds supporting the “Freedom Convoy” of truckers opposed to vaccine mandates as it wound its way through the province on Friday. “It was so beautiful to watch everyone come together and unite," she posted to Instagram. It’s not the first time Haynes has publicly criticized COVID-19 health measures imposed by governments across Canada – including the one led by her father. She is married to Dave “Juggernaut” Haynes, who recently left the Toronto Police Service after refusing to get vaccinated.
Hans Langsdorff: Steve Parish, former mayor of Ajax and the NDP’s star candidate in that riding for the upcoming provincial election, is under fire for allowing a street in his city to be named after a man who fought for Nazi Germany. A little history here: Ajax is named after a British ship that fought in the Battle of the River Plate in 1939, and many of the city’s streets are named after people who served in that battle for the Allies. When Parish was mayor in 2007, with the blessing of the River Plate Veterans Association, one street was named in honour of Hans Langsdorff, the captain of the German ship in that battle. Langsdorff is credited with saving the lives of more than 1,000 of his men when he refused to follow Hitler’s order to fight to the last man, and instead scuttled the ship when he believed defeat was inevitable. Despite his gallantry in battle, many feel naming a street after someone who fought to advance Nazi aims is beyond the pale. “Today, it all seems so bizarrely offensive, insensitive and inexplicable,” columnist Martin Regg Cohn wrote in the Toronto Star on Saturday. Parish has defended naming the street after Langsdorff as recently as 2020, though he did issue a statement apologizing for having “caused pain to some people in the Jewish community in Ajax and beyond in Ontario.” The street was renamed Croker Drive in 2021.
Freedom of religion: A court case begins today where two Ontario churches will argue that the province’s COVID-19 public health measures violated freedom of religion and assembly protections under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The Church of God in Aylmer and the Trinity Bible Chapel in Waterloo have both been charged with violating gathering limits and other public health restrictions. "It's absolutely clear in the case law that if you restrict the numbers that are able to worship or you constrain the ability of churches to gather, you've interfered with the freedom of religion,” constitutional law expert Eric Adams of the University of Alberta told CBC News. “The question then becomes, 'Has the government done so in a reasonable manner?' The onus will then be on the government to demonstrate that its decisions were justified in a free and democratic society."
Reopening: Several public health measures that were put in place earlier this month to combat the Omicron variant have been lifted as of 12:01 a.m. this morning. Read the full list of what’s changing.
Beyond the Pink Palace
COVID-19 cases:Ontario reported there were 3,019 people in hospital after testing positive for COVID-19. Of those, 587 were in intensive care.
Protesters behaving badly: Just a tip if you’re ever planning to organize a major protest in Ottawa: Dressing up the statue of Terry Fox located near Parliament Hill in protest gear is a bad PR move. During demonstrations Saturday organized by truckers protesting vaccine mandates, the Canadian icon’s statue was outfitted with a Canadian flag upside down and a sign saying “mandate freedom.” The decision to use Fox as a political prop was condemned by basically everyone. Protesters also verbally harassed and demanded food from the staff of a soup kitchen, forced the closure of LCBO and Beer Store locations in downtown Ottawa, danced on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and urinated on the National War Memorial. Asked by Travis Dhanraj of CBC News to explain why people would urinate on the memorial, one trucker said there were no portable toilets available. Ottawa police say several criminal investigations are underway in relation to the protesters.
And it may not be over: You’d think after a full weekend of demonstrating and disrupting life in downtown Ottawa, the Freedom Convoy protesters would decide they’ve made their point and go home. But you would be wrong. B.J. Dichter, one of the protest organizers, told a press conference for right-wing media outlets that the goal is to create a "logistics nightmare" for the government and force it to repeal vaccine mandates. "We're in this one for the long haul,” he said. “We don't have a time limit." Stuntman Stu, a veteran Ottawa radio personality, wondered on Twitter “How much longer is our city going to be held hostage?” Ottawa police have advised people avoid traveling to the downtown core and work from home today if possible.