EZRA LEVANT ｜ I have some new hope and I’d like to tell you why
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Summary
Pastor Arthur Pavlowski, his brother David Pavlinski and Chris Scott were all appealing a sentence that was handed down by a lockdownist judge named Adam Germain, and the good guys won. Today's episode is all about why.
Transcript
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Hello, my Rebels. Let me invite you to watch today's podcast, and by watch it, I mean get
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the video version of it. I'm going to be talking about the great victory yesterday in the Alberta
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Court of Appeal. You can watch it in the video form by subscribing to Rebel News Plus. Just
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go to rebelnewsplus.com. It's $8 a month. You get my daily podcast in video, plus weekly
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podcasts from Sheila Gunn-Reed, David Menzies, and Andrew Chapados, all for $8, half the
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cost of Netflix, and I tell you, that's what keeps us free from government money. I mean,
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we would never take it, but that's how we're able to survive without taking it. So please
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consider subscribing. All right, here's today's podcast.
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Tonight, I have some new hope, and I'd like to tell you why. It's November 26, and this
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Why should others go to jail when you're a biggest carbon consumer I know?
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There's 8,500 customers here, and you won't give them an answer. The only thing I have to
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say to the government, the why I'm publishing, is because it's my bloody right to do so.
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We had a huge win in court yesterday, a senior court, the Alberta Court of Appeal. That's the
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highest court in Alberta. Maybe you saw my quick video update about it yesterday, and please watch
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Sheila Gunn-Reed's video on the subject too. Pastor Arthur Pavlovsky, his brother David, and a small
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businessman named Chris Scott, they were all appealing an atrocious sentence that was handed
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down by a lockdownist judge named Adam Germain, and the good guys won. Absolutely won. Justice Joanne
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Stratkaff of the Court of Appeal heard an application by these three men, all with lawyers crowdfunded by us,
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to stay the sentence that had been meted out against them. That is to freeze their sentence,
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to suspend it on an emergency basis until a full proper appeal can be heard by the Court of Appeal
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next year. As in, there will be a longer hearing at the Court of Appeal, probably with three judges,
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but that won't happen until June. So Justice Stratkaff made an urgent ruling yesterday that effective
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immediately, the most atrocious aspects of the sentence against these men are suspended.
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They don't have to live under that sentence while they wait for the appeal in June.
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Let me tell you, to get a stay, as it's called, is not easy. You have to prove irreparable harm
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and a likelihood of the success of your appeal. So the fact that the three men won yesterday
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is not only a great victory in itself, but it is a signal, I believe, that this atrocious sentence
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will be properly torn to ribbons in June by the full Court of Appeal. This was a quick case.
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The judge yesterday pronounced her ruling the same day, orally. She wouldn't wait. She'll put out a
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written statement later, but she literally wouldn't wait an hour before freeing the men. If I were the
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Alberta government, the prosecutors, the thuggish lower court judge who made this outrageous sentence
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in the first place, I wouldn't be feeling very optimistic right now. Just some quick background
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in case you forgot some of the details. You remember Pastor Arthur Pawlowski. He was the viral
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international sensation when he hollered, get out, at police who had the audacity and the grossness
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to come into his church physically in the middle of a church service. Well, the cops didn't like that
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video going viral. So, you know, they returned the favor.
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Three days in maximum security prison for him and his brother. Why did they have that SWAT team
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style takedown? Was he dangerous? The third man who was jailed and sentenced was Chris Scott.
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He runs really the only store in the tiny town of Mirror, Alberta. It's got a gas station general
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store. They have some tables for lunch. Everyone in town knows the whistle stop. Everyone knows Chris
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Scott. The town he's in is smaller than my old high school. There's no mystery in Mirror, Alberta.
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There's no unknown people. You either kept going to the restaurant, which I think most normal people
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in the town did, or you followed Teresa Tam's advice from out in Ottawa, and you stayed at home and
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you lived in fear. You would think Alberta's cops would leave things alone, but they had a great
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vengeance against Chris Scott. They put him behind bars as well. There's something really wrong with
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Alberta these days. So anyways, these three men, the two Pavlovskis and Chris Scott, were sentenced
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for contempt of court in the same time by the same judge. But this bizarre lower court judge I'm telling
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about, Adam and Jermaine, he not only fined them, but he ordered them not to leave the province of
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Alberta for more than a year. What? What? What does that have to do with opening their church or a
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restaurant during the lockdown? Why are they forbidden to leave the province? Well, this bitter judge made
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it clear in his sentencing he was personally furious that Pastor Arthur Pavlovsky had gone to the United
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States on a speaking tour about civil liberties and churches. The judge specifically mentioned that.
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He specifically condemned that. He specifically referred to Arthur taking a selfie with a U.S.
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politician. What's that got to do with anything? Specifically raging at the fact that Arthur went
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on Fox News. What's that got to do with anything? None of this had anything to do with his alleged
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offense of keeping his church open for one hour. But to stop him from talking about it, he banned
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Arthur from leaving the province. So no more speaking tours. And he did the most atrocious
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thing, a deep embarrassment to the court system, truly bringing the administration of justice into
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disrepute. Justice Jermaine actually ordered that from that moment on, whenever these three men ever
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criticized the government on Facebook, in a speech, in a church sermon, in a media interview, they had to
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immediately then take out a little speech that the judge himself wrote and read it, essentially
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renouncing and denouncing themselves. Sorry, that's compelled speech. That's a Maoist struggle
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session. That's what communists do. This disgraceful judge, Adam Jermaine, who's only a judge because he
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ran and failed as a liberal politician. So Jean Chrétien put him on the court as a loot bag, as a
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consolation prize. Adam Jermaine wrote a little homemade speech that he ordered these three men to say,
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whenever they felt like saying their own political thoughts, they had to say his. What does any of
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this have to do with, you know, their alleged offenses, refusing to close their church, refusing to
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apologize for opening their church in their store? And since when do Canadian judges get to violate your
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charter rights like that just because they're political hacks like Adam Jermaine? So awful, so abusive,
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but really, why not? I've been paying attention to the laws and orders and trials and punishments
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since this pandemic started. As you know, we represent over 2,000 people who have had lockdown
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tickets and fines. That's our Fight the Fines project. And now we're getting involved in bigger
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battles over vaccine passports. I've seen cases in many provinces, in different courts, at different
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levels. We've crowdfunded for many of them, and they all have one thing in common. No judge has ever
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struck down a pandemic law. Every case is lost. Now, our Fight the Fines cases are winning, but those are
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small tickets. But the bigger cases, the constitutional, they've all lost. No matter what the plaintiff looks
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like, loud people like Pastor Arthur, quiet people like Pastor James Coates, rude people, polite people,
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religious people, non-religious people, people of every and any background, people with great lawyers,
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people with not so great lawyers, people with no lawyers, everyone has lost in any substantial
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challenge to the laws. I think the absolute strongest case so far was earlier this year when our
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own reporter at the time, Kian Bextie, was detained at the Calgary Airport Hotel quarantine when he flew
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into Calgary from the United States. Now, he had parked his car at the airport, and he wanted to just
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go straight into his car and straight home to quarantine the home. But the government forced him
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to pay outrageous fees to stay at the airport quarantine hotel. And he counted, he actually had
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interactions with 14 different people at that hotel as opposed to just heading straight home in his own car.
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So I thought that was a powerful case. There were some other plaintiffs in the same hearing,
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other lawyers too, some good lawyers. The facts were so strong. This was a three-day detention of
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healthy people, of innocent people, at great expense. And there was absolutely no health reason to do so.
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None. Like I say, how is quarantining in a public hotel safer than in your private home? It just doesn't
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make sense. Well, here's how that case ended. The federal court not only upheld the legality of the
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jails, but they ruled that it didn't even violate the charter. They said it didn't even count as a
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detention. You're literally detained by force of law for three days. And the federal court wouldn't
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even concede that it was a detention. They didn't say it's a detention, but it's justified because of
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blah, blah, blah, blah. They literally just said, no, no, no, no, no. There's nothing wrong here. We
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don't even have to justify anything because it's not even a detention. Really? Yeah. So the judge said
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so much for our democracy's supposed checks and balances. I'll admit it. I have been pessimistic.
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I have not been hopeless, but I've been close. There's a difference between optimism
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and hope. I think hope is when you believe in your heart that things could get better.
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I think optimism is when you think with your brain that they will get better. I don't know.
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One sort of faith and one is reason. Is that? That's my attempt at distinguishing between the
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two words, optimism and hope. You tell me. So I have been pessimistic, even very pessimistic,
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because when I use my brain, I see every force in society in league with the lockdown, every
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government in Canada and every opposition in Canada and every corporate media outlet and every
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big business and small business and every chamber of commerce and every traditional civil liberties
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group, every university, every pundit and every judge. That hotel case made me pessimistic. If that's
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not going to win, what would? Earlier, I said every small business. No, let me change that. A lot of
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small businesses did try and fight, but they were almost alone. Every human rights commission refused to
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uphold human rights. Every college of physicians and surgeons launched inquisitions against doctors
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who stand with their patients. The college is siding with politicians against doctors and their
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patients. Just yesterday, a police raid on a doctor's office in Calgary. Yeah, that's why I'm pessimistic.
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But this news from the case of Arthur and David Pawlowski and Chris Scott, it gave me hope, hope that maybe the
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smarter, more senior, more serious, more grown-up judges in the country are about to weigh in and
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reset the balance. I don't know. Maybe the grown-ups have realized this is going too far. That's my hope.
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You know, the same Justice Strekaff that ruled against Justice Germain and upheld the rights of
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the Pawlowski just last week was on the Court of Appeal that ruled against Rebel News on a billboard
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free speech case. We're seeking leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada on that. But I mentioned
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that to show that Justice Strekaff, the good judge who stayed the abusive sentence against these three
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men, she's ruled against us before, just recently. So this must have been a really egregious case for
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her. These three men, the Pawlowski's and Chris Scott. I am pleased. I am hopeful. And I know this,
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this wouldn't happen without our little system. And by that, I mean our outstanding lawyers
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who were there in court. We were crowdfunding the lawyers for all three men. I don't have the legal
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bills in front of me, but I am certain we've spent hundreds of thousands of dollars between these
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three men over the last year. Again, it's the unlimited resources of the state. We had excellent
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lawyers and we won yesterday. Now those lawyers would not have been possible without our Rebel News
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viewers chipping in. There's just no way that an ordinary pastor or a diner owner in Muir, Alberta
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could muster that kind of dough. There's just no way at all. And even finding the best lawyers around,
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that matters too. And appealing every single loss aggressively, even against all odds, refusing to
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say die, refusing to give up. That's what did it. That's only possible because of our Rebel News
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viewers and donors. And that's what's so sad and so scary is that it was just us there. No one else
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was in court with us for these men. No civil liberties group, no chamber of commerce for the
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restaurateur, no religious group chipping in for the pastors. We're not for our lawyers and we're not for
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our funders. And by that, I mean you. This atrocious sentence would still be the law and it would be the
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new precedent that you could order people to denounce themselves. Compelled speech. Think about that. We not
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only set aside the sentence that was abusing these three men, we not only freed these three men, but we now
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have a judge, Adam Germain, who was seriously rebuked for the idea of compelled speech. And that would have been
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an awful precedent to let stand. If we weren't there in court, who would have been? I salute
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the three men for fighting. I salute the lawyers for their smarts and their energy. But it is our Rebel
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News viewers who paid for it. I hope you feel pride and satisfaction. And I hope you feel just a little
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bit hopeful again. I do. The battle is not over. It's going to get worse yet before it gets better.
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But today, for the first time in nearly two years, I can say that I truly believe in my heart
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that we can win. I don't know if we will win, but I again believe that it is possible.
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Thank you for being a part of this. And thanks to our great reporters on the ground in Alberta,
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Sheila Gunn-Reed, Adam Sos, Kian Simone, the rest of our team, for telling the story of these men too.
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Thanks for being part of it. Stay with us for more.
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Well, this news of the victory in the Court of Appeal of Alberta yesterday,
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staying the worst parts of the sentence against Arthur Pawlowski's brother David and Chris Scott
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has just been ricocheting around in my mind like a pinball. I'm thrilled with the result,
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but it's done more than just give me some hope for the particular clients. It's given me a hope
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that in general, maybe we will see some return to rationality and the concept of checks and balances.
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You know, the idea that the different branches of government hold each other to account that the
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judiciary can limit the excesses of the executive and the legislature. It's given me a little bit of
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hope, but I have only heard about it through Sheila Gunn-Reed, who was live tweeting the court.
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She was watching online, as court cases are these days, and was live tweeting it. She was there,
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and I'm delighted to call her in now to join us with a personal update. Sheila, it's great to see
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you. I am so hopeful about this case. Yeah, me too. I mean, we've seen a lot of victories. I would
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definitely call them victories along the fight the fines case pipeline. We've seen those. But what's
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happening with those is the Crown is withdrawing the expensive tickets before we get to a place in
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the process where we can set legal precedent by fighting the ticket and winning the ticket. The
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Crown says, we're just going to withdraw. We don't want to get to that point. What happened here is
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totally different. We went all the way, and we got to the sanctions portion, and we appealed the
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sanctions while we appeal everything else. And what Justice Strekoff ruled yesterday was a complete
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and total rebuke of Justice Adam Germain, who ruled that not only are Chris Scott and the Poloski
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Brothers prohibited from traveling around the country and telling people what is exactly happening
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here in Alberta on the ground. But they have to preface every single public statement, not with
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just the government's line, but the more and more I think about it, it's really Justice Adam Germain's
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words that he ordered be put in the mouths of these men before they make any statement critical of
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lockdowns, vaccines, and government restrictions. You know, it's truly incredible. And I know that
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every judge is appointed by a politician, but some judges before they sit on the bench have a stellar
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career in the law. They're skilled litigators who are outstanding experts in contract law or
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constitutional law. And they really are so smart that people of any stripe say, wow, that guy's or that
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girl's so smart, we got to get him on the bench, because they're going to help improve our country. That was
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not the way Adam Germain got on the court. He was a failed liberal politician. And Jean Chrétien has two big
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gifts for guys like that, put him in the Senate, or put him on the bench, both are appointments till like 75. And
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unfortunately for the country, he put Adam Germain, liberal failed politician on the bench. And who knows how many
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bizarre judgments he's dealt out over the years, but he's been exposed, I think, by this case, and his raw fury, and I
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think bigotry against the Pavlovskis, very disheartening when it happened. But why do I feel good that the court of
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Yeah, I mean, it's, it's really something to see, because if this judgment were just left hanging there, this would be
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something that could be used against other lockdown critics going forward, people who find themselves on the wrong
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side of a secretly obtained court order, as was the case here. This could have been just a precedent. I sat in on all these
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court hearings, where the lawyers were referencing other cases of lockdowners receiving large fines, just to put
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into context for the judge, what should have been done here. So this would have been out there as you know, a
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comparable case for other people by which to ask a judge for these sort of similar sanctions. But it's, we should
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note that Alberta Health Services, as out of control as they are, as wild and crazy as they are, as sinister
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as they are, getting this court order secretly obtained, ex parte, without letting the Poloski's lawyer, Sarah
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Miller, know, or Chad Williamson's, or Chad Williamson, who's the lawyer for Chris Scott. Alberta Health Services
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never asked for the travel ban that was levied against these men. Alberta Health Services never asked for the
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compelled speech order either. That is something that Justice Adam Germain just cooked up in his own
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head. Alberta Health Services knew that this would look pretty gross if they asked for anything beyond
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expecting the men to comply with the public health orders of the day, because for Alberta Health Services,
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so they say this was always about keeping the community safe. I'm not so sure about that. Feels like it was
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about teaching everybody a lesson. And they wanted fines and community service and court costs.
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They got all that. But Judge Germain cooked up this other stuff that nobody asked for.
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On the flip side, though, Alberta Health Services, they sure didn't object when Germain ordered these
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things into the judgment. And they were there yesterday fighting to keep them in. So while they didn't ask for
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them, they were more than happy to have found out that Germain just went off script and did his own
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thing. Yeah. You know, I was watching part of the Kyle Rittenhouse trial in the United States. And
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one of the instructions to jury members is not to do any research of your own, not to look at the news,
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not to Google things. And the reason for that is you may think you found something really on point,
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but maybe it's wrong. Maybe it's misleading. And both sides haven't had a chance to sort of deal
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with it. So even if you think you've, you have just a very simple question you need to answer,
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the judges say to the jury members, don't use any facts or information other than what you've heard
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in the trial. And it's a very important point. And it also in a way applies to a judge, except for you
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normally don't have to tell a judge that. And the reason I mentioned that is there was nothing
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in the court cases against the Pavlovskis or Chris Scott that had to do with fake news or junk science
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or conspiracy theories or whatever, like all these things that the media have smeared these men with.
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It just simply wasn't part of the case against them. The case was very simple. They kept their
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church open during the lockdown and Chris Scott kept his diner open during the lockdown. That's
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the case. And so what happened is Judge Germain read the news on his own that was not disputed or
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debated in his courtroom. And he meted out a punishment for the stuff he read in the news that wasn't
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tested in court. So that's where his ban on travel came from, because he hated the fact that he saw
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Arthur Pavlovsky taking a selfie with an American politician. That's where the travel ban came from.
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That's where the self-denunciation came from. It had nothing to do with the case in front of the court.
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So that judge, Germain, made the mistake that amateur jury members are instructed not to make,
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which is sorry. You can't do your own thing. You can't scratch your own personal itches.
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And I just want to say, Sheila, last I checked, our petition to take Justice Germain to the
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Canadian Judicial Council to have him investigated had well over 25,000 signatures. And folks,
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if you hadn't put your name to it yet, please consider doing so. Go to firethejudge.com.
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It's rare that a judge is fired in Canada, but it does happen. And this judge is so out of control.
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And I'm not saying that it was just the wrong decision. Judges can get it wrong,
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and that's fine. The court of appeal fixes it. But this judge was abusive towards the brothers,
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used his own grudges and his own fake information. And this judge should never have been in the court
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in the first place. So please go to firethejudge.com, and we'll see what can happen. Anyways,
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don't mind me ranting a bit, Sheila. I'm feeling pretty good, actually.
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Yeah. And people at that special website, firethejudge.com, there's a special link
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there where you can click on and send a personalized message to the Canadian Judicial
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Council. I'm sure they get maybe five emails a month. Send them as many as you can to let them
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know how seriously we're taking this. Because it was pretty clear that the judge let his own prejudice
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against lockdown objectors seep in. Because as you rightly point out, the only thing that they
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really did wrong here was, it's not like they were out pamphleting anti-vaccine information or
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selling fake COVID cures. It wasn't any of that. Chris Scott refused to go broke quietly. And then when
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the government seized his property, he wanted to hold a protest of that which the government has
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just done to them. The Poloskis just wanted to open church because they see themselves as frontline
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workers. Just like police and EMS, they minister and take care of the immediate needs of the poor
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in Calgary. That's all they wanted to do. But Justice Streka yesterday said to an Alberta Health
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Services lawyer, and her question garnered about 20 minutes of stunned, confused silence from a
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government lawyer, which usually they just like to hear themselves talk. She asked the government
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lawyer, if this compelled speech sanction does not qualify as irreparable harm against these men,
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can you please tell me what does? And he couldn't. He couldn't answer her. Because it does,
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when you are violating somebody's charter rights, do not speak what's on their heart about the things
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that which the government is directly doing to them. That's irreparable harm. You're forcing someone
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to, especially somebody like Art, who, you know, for him, he takes his moral convictions very seriously.
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For him, this is a matter of his soul, his eternity, if he violates his conscience. And that is what
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Justice Adam Germain in his anti-Christian bigotry. Those are my words, not any of the lawyers. But
00:26:49.300
that's what I think is at play here. Yeah. Well, I feel like this is a flicker of hope that when the
00:26:55.900
more senior judges, the calmer judges, the judges that are perhaps more sober-minded, more public-minded,
00:27:04.820
calmer, you know, if you're on the court of appeal, you may have gotten your toe in the door in court
00:27:13.300
through patronage like Adam Germain, but you're probably not getting on the court of appeal until
00:27:18.400
you've really proven you're a great judge. Like any second-hand, third-rate lawyer can get on the
00:27:25.420
bench if you donate enough to a prime minister. That's Adam Germain. But to move from regular judge
00:27:32.300
to one of the handful of court of appeal judges, I don't care what your ideology is, you're probably
00:27:38.180
smart and accomplished. And you're probably a good judge just from, like, you're not going to get
00:27:44.180
bumped up on a patronage as you got bumped in on a patronage. So I'm glad that as we get to the
00:27:51.880
court of appeal level in so many of these cases, we're going to have those smarter, more careful,
00:27:57.000
less wild judges. And hopefully the pendulum will start swinging back. And Sheila, as I said in my
00:28:02.940
monologue, if we hadn't been there, no one would have been. There was no one else who was going to
00:28:11.460
stand up against this compelled speech. And by we, I mean lawyers that were crowdfunded by Rebel News
00:28:17.240
viewers, lawyers to represent all three of those men. And I shudder to think what would happen if that
00:28:23.960
sentence had become the precedent. Last word to you.
00:28:28.600
Well, I just want to thank everybody at home for their generous donations to SaveArthur.com and to
00:28:35.760
FightTheFines.com. I saw the impact of your donations play out in real time yesterday. There's absolutely
00:28:43.660
no way the Poloskis could have fought this the way that they have. There's absolutely no way that Chris
00:28:49.320
Scott could have fought for his own free speech, the way that donations were able to enable for him.
00:28:57.260
And so I'm just so very grateful that we have this opportunity to be the vehicle to provide support
00:29:03.980
to these frontline freedom fighters in the interest of free speech. So thank you to everybody at home.
00:29:13.140
Yeah, it's a good feeling to see that finally pay off. And we've been helping Arthur since April
00:29:18.540
of 2020. If you can believe it, when you think about it, that's quite a battle. I mean, we're not
00:29:24.180
done yet. The Court of Appeal full hearing is in June, but I am pretty, pretty pleased with how it's
00:29:30.700
going. Sheila, thanks. And you've been on the FightTheFines project and the FightVaccinePassports.com
00:29:37.340
project for two years yourself. So you have, I think, done the lion's share of our reporting on
00:29:44.580
these subjects. And I think it's very important, very important. So thank you for the work you've
00:29:48.980
done as our chief reporter. Well, it sure keeps my tank full when I need this sort of inspiration to
00:29:57.080
go out there and tackle the day's news. It's good to see the people that we're able to help and interact
00:30:02.520
with them all the time. You know, in a time where all the news is bad, I get to hear about how we're
00:30:07.840
able to help people and make the day a little bit better for their families. So again, all of that
00:30:12.480
possible through our donors at home. Right on. Thanks, Sheila. Thanks, Ezra. Cheers. There's
00:30:18.580
Sheila Gunn-Reed, our chief reporter. Stay with us. Your views are next.
00:30:32.520
Hey, welcome back. Your viewer feedback. Ken Barrett, 77 says,
00:30:39.900
if your mRNA treatment is so effective, then why do you cling to your no liability so tightly?
00:30:46.380
Exactly. The whole concept of product liability, it's actually centuries old. Now, I understand
00:30:54.080
people taking something out of desperation. They say, I don't care what the risk is. I need it so badly.
00:31:00.880
Let me take it. I support people's right to do that, actually. If they know the risks, but they're
00:31:07.580
so... It's like if someone runs out of medical solutions to, God forbid, cancer. I would support
00:31:15.540
their right to choose alternative treatments, even if they're not proven. If you're dying anyways,
00:31:20.880
let someone make the choice. But we have the exact opposite situation here. You're being forced on pain
00:31:27.100
of losing your job, losing your access to public life. You're being forced to take something you
00:31:32.480
don't want to take, and there's no legal liability there. That is, that's the worst case.
00:31:40.880
Luke Doe DT says, we should have a choice if we want to pay for certain services these liberals
00:31:47.160
provide, tied to paying for his holidays and royal living. You know, you could be talking about so many
00:31:54.060
different people. But, you know, I just assume you're talking about Justin Trudeau and his endless
00:31:59.400
days off. He skipped parliament already, if you can believe him. Daniel Baer said, what? The courts
00:32:07.100
actually acted with some level of real justice? Thank God for small mercies. At this stage of the
00:32:12.640
game, I'll take any good news. Let's keep this going. Thanks. I'm sure you're writing about the case of
00:32:18.080
Arthur Pawlowski, his brother, and Chris Scott. I just want to say again, and I said this in our
00:32:23.220
staff meeting this morning, if Rebel News viewers had not crowdfunded those talented lawyers who won
00:32:31.220
in court yesterday, there's no way that these plaintiffs, Arthur Pawlowski's brother David and
00:32:40.340
Chris, there's just no way they would have been able to afford top lawyers. I'm sorry, they just don't
00:32:44.820
have an extra 200 grand kicking around or whatever the total cost over the last year has been.
00:32:50.240
And no one else was in there. The Civil Liberties Association was not in there. There was no religious
00:32:55.420
charity fighting for the pastors. There was no business group like the Chamber of Commerce fighting
00:33:00.180
for the restaurateur. They wouldn't have been to court. They wouldn't have been able to appeal.
00:33:06.740
And so the sentence meted out, this compelled speech sentence, that would now be Canadian precedence.
00:33:13.940
Can you believe that? It's a miracle to me that Rebel News viewers fill the gap. And I thank you for
00:33:21.980
it. And I want to tell you, it's put me in a positive mood. I was, I won't lie, I was getting a
00:33:27.020
little down in the dumps. But I feel like there's a little bit of hope out there now. I hope you feel
00:33:32.140
the same way. Let me close by showing you the video of the day, as we call it, our friend Tamara
00:33:37.620
Ugolini, at the Belleville Wild Wings, still fighting vaccine passports. I'll say goodbye to
00:33:43.960
you now. Until next time, keep fighting for freedom. And look at Tamara, a great freedom
00:33:51.320
How do they expect businesses who don't have background in law, we're not lawyers, we're
00:33:57.640
business owners. So how are we supposed to honour and walk within the law when it is very confusing
00:34:06.140
right now? This court case could potentially set a precedent. And it's important for all
00:34:11.380
Canadians. It's important for the future of our children. It's important for the freedoms
00:34:19.140
With Rebel News, I'm Tamara Ugolini back in Belleville, Ontario with owner Jackie Banas
00:34:27.960
at Wild Wings, her establishment where you came into the Rebel through our We Won't Ask
00:34:34.280
campaign. That's the campaign geared towards small businesses who think that it's none of
00:34:38.820
their business whether or not people divulge their personal medical information in order
00:34:44.420
to dine in or frequent your establishment. So since the time of that interview, I guess
00:34:49.100
we're going on about a month later now. What has the support or what has the atmosphere
00:34:57.220
So it's actually been phenomenal. The support that we receive here is outstanding. And I
00:35:03.420
just want to thank everyone. You guys have been incredible. New people that we've never
00:35:08.180
seen dine here before. People are driving great distances to come and support us. And then
00:35:14.380
the locals are showing up more frequently than they had previously just to really show support.
00:35:20.060
So we've we've found I've actually like normally on a Friday night before any of this started,
00:35:26.880
we would need maybe four staff. We now needed seven on a Friday night to get through the kind
00:35:32.080
of busy rush that we had. And now we have multiple rushes back to back. So just seeing the amount of
00:35:38.280
support. It's it's funny, the people that we have conversations and we sort of like there's multiple
00:35:44.560
people just in tears. The conversations that people are having now seem to be really authentic and
00:35:49.480
connecting. So it's just really nice to see people so grateful and happy and appreciative and
00:35:55.500
supportive of us and grateful for the support we are giving them. And it's it's almost like,
00:36:01.780
you know, building a community when that's been so degraded over the last almost two years.
00:36:07.800
How does that compare with what you're hearing from other businesses who have decided to
00:36:17.260
Yeah. So I don't know. I haven't spoken to a lot of other business owners, but I have spoken to other
00:36:23.280
people who are either frequenting other businesses or work at them because the way the regulations are
00:36:30.180
written that people can work at other restaurants don't need to be vaccinated, but then they're not
00:36:36.100
even allowed to dine at their own restaurant they work at. And so I know it's funny. But so we do have
00:36:43.220
some local servers that are working at other restaurants and they come here for meals and
00:36:49.240
then they also do say that they've noticed the business has slowed down dramatically at some of
00:36:55.240
the other restaurants. I've noticed if I've gone for takeout somewhere, because I'm still trying to
00:37:00.740
support every business in town the best I can, restaurants especially. So we try to get some takeout
00:37:05.380
frequently from different places. And even when I go there, if they are offering dine in options,
00:37:10.400
there's maybe only one table or two tables on a Friday, Saturday night, which we're packed every
00:37:16.300
table, you know. So the people are clearly standing here with you. The hammer has essentially come down
00:37:23.280
on you since our last report. Tell us where you're at with the health unit and what's happened.
00:37:30.700
So I think I had received 21 fines the last time you were here. But if not, we're up to 21.
00:37:40.600
And then the health unit contacted the liquor board, the AGCO, and advised them that because of the fines
00:37:48.720
that they had issued, they were all sort of of the opinion I was no longer in good standing with the
00:37:54.080
health unit. Even though at this moment in time, I have chosen to plead not guilty on all of those fines.
00:38:00.420
And send them to the courts for an actual trial. Right now, the AGCO has suspended my liquor license.
00:38:08.240
So they are right now treating me as guilty, needing to prove my innocence versus the way
00:38:13.760
Canadian law really should be innocent until proven guilty. Which I believe is why they've only
00:38:20.040
suspended it. They're trying to take some actions, but they haven't revoked it completely. So I guess
00:38:26.580
that's kind of where they're in that gray area of still trying to treat me somewhat innocent versus
00:38:30.580
guilty all the way. But so then last week, the AGCO, after several conversations with them, and they
00:38:37.880
got information from the health department, they did decide to suspend us. So last week, they suspended
00:38:43.460
us. And then somehow, I'm not sure, but somehow then I don't know if the AGCO contacted some news
00:38:49.220
outlets. But on Friday, I got a lot of information, different people contacting me, different news
00:38:56.340
outlets contacting me, like CTV, CP24, like big ones, you know, down in Toronto. And so there was a lot of
00:39:02.720
articles put out. I did do some interviews, radio interviews, just explaining the position of the AGCO.
00:39:11.500
And then I've also received a letter from the health unit, they've now taken a court action against
00:39:20.700
me. So they brought an application under section nine of the ROA. And so that will be happening on
00:39:27.660
Thursday, where we're going to be defending that. And so you've hired a legal team, and you are working
00:39:35.740
within the law to push back against this. How can our viewers or the general public support you?
00:39:44.780
So yeah, we've, we've decided that the best way to try to fight this, we're hoping is to use the law,
00:39:51.240
and stay within the law. We're not trying to just break all laws. I know that it might appear because
00:39:57.240
we're not asking for vaccine status. And we're not aggressively pushing every single patron who comes
00:40:04.380
in here to make sure they have a mask on. We're honoring the exemptions, according to even what
00:40:09.160
the health unit has told us, there are exemptions. It's against the law for us to ask what an exemption
00:40:14.200
is. So we're honoring if guests show up, or if staff choose not to wear a mask, we're honoring that
00:40:20.380
they are claiming the exemption. And we believe that the asking for the medical information of whether
00:40:29.080
someone is vaccinated or not is violating many laws, privacy acts and human rights discrimination laws and all
00:40:39.660
sorts of things. So we're doing our best to try to work within the law. When it appears to me and our staff
00:40:46.340
here, it appears that some of the laws are conflicting and contradicting each other. So we're doing our best to try to
00:40:53.940
honor as much of all the laws as we can without violating any of them. And so that's part of what
00:41:01.260
will hopefully be discussed during the court case on Thursday, November 25th, is bringing light to the
00:41:09.540
fact that the laws are kind of conflicting with one another. And how do they expect businesses who don't
00:41:17.260
have background in law, we're not lawyers, we're business owners. So how are we supposed to
00:41:21.940
honor and and walk within the law? When it is very confusing right now?
00:41:28.940
You're not lawyers, and you're also not doctors, you're not health professionals. Some of your staff
00:41:34.160
maybe is even not allowed to determine whether someone's of age to drink. And yet they're being
00:41:39.960
asked to check people's IDs for their medical status. The whole thing seems very discombobulated.
00:41:47.220
Now, this is comes at no small cost to you, Jackie, your personal cost associated with fighting against
00:41:54.880
this, what you called off camera, this Goliath. So how are you funding this? And and how can you know,
00:42:02.820
your patrons support you in taking this stand? Because obviously, there's massive support for you,
00:42:08.220
as evidenced by how busy you are. Yeah, actually, that's sorry, it brings up a lot of emotion when
00:42:14.400
you talk about this, because, you know, I've I've spent a lot of time with with God and learning
00:42:21.840
about how money is just a tool and and that a lot of people have a lot of attachment to it. And I've
00:42:26.560
worked a lot in my life to break any attachment to money. So when God said to move forward with this,
00:42:34.260
because it's something that is necessary. This court case could potentially set a precedent. And
00:42:40.660
it's important for all Canadians. It's important for the future of our children. It's important for
00:42:46.320
the freedoms that we believe we have now to continue. It's important for all of that. And so
00:42:52.780
if God said, move forward, then I said, Okay, but it is going to be expensive. I personally don't have
00:42:59.940
all the money that I believe it might come to my own lawyer fees are expensive. And potentially,
00:43:07.780
depending on what the judge rules, if the judge does not see eye to eye on us, and rules against
00:43:14.220
us, then I will be held liable for the other side's court costs as well. So it potentially could
00:43:21.040
get extremely expensive. People have suggested I don't always like asking for help. But people have
00:43:27.520
suggested that I do start a crowdfunding to because the people come in here and they'll just give me
00:43:32.680
cash. People are just like, you know, how can we help and they'll give me a $5 bill here, just anything
00:43:37.200
that helps to go towards it. But people did suggest if I could get a crowdfunding going that it might
00:43:42.680
be able to help support financially a little bit more. And where can people find that?
00:43:48.320
So we're, we used the give send go platform. So it's www.give send go.com slash wild wing
00:43:58.600
Belleville. And of course, just coming and having a bite to eat tipping your server. Well,
00:44:04.520
these are small things that again, you you told me off camera that help toward bettering the future
00:44:11.680
of small business and freedom of choice in Canada. It was really funny. We actually had this one was the
00:44:16.700
best. We had a customer who lives in Windsor place an online order. And in his notes, he said,
00:44:22.760
don't actually make the food, I won't be there to pick it up. I just wanted to give you some money to
00:44:27.180
help. And so he just that was the way he knew how to do it as he placed an online order, and then said,
00:44:32.500
but please don't make it so we didn't waste the food. So you know, people are doing whatever it is
00:44:36.420
they can to help and people are calling and offering support. And there's also on that give send go
00:44:41.720
there's a prayer request section. So you can just add your prayers to the list of everybody else praying.
00:44:46.700
Well, keep me posted how things go on Thursday. I hope that this interview will go out before then,
00:44:52.360
or maybe even on Thursday. And we'll see how the judge rules based on the use of lawyers
00:45:01.120
and law in Ontario to challenge the reopening Ontario Act. In Belleville, Ontario. I'm Tamara
00:45:08.700
Ugolini for Rebel News. If you question whether or not asking people for their medical documents to
00:45:16.300
dine in or frequent your establishment is actually within the law. And some of these
00:45:21.460
laws and regulations and rules seem to be conflicting with one another, then head on over to our campaign
00:45:28.540
at wewontask.com. It's a portal for small businesses who won't be asking people to divulge their personal
00:45:34.820
information in order to enter or dine in at their establishment. You can sign up for our campaign
00:45:41.020
there. We'll send you some nifty stickers if you choose to put them up, and maybe we'll even feature
00:45:45.200
your business. All of that information can be found at wewontask.com.