Juno News - February 04, 2022


Truckers for Freedom convoy stands their ground in Ottawa


Episode Stats


Length

3 minutes

Words per minute

202.82649

Word count

775

Sentence count

63


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Truckers have been demonstrating in the streets of Ottawa for over a week. They say they are here to protest against the government's vaccine mandate and the Trudeau government's plan to give all Canadians the right to get their voice heard.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
00:00:00.000 Harrison Falcon reporting live for True North on Wellington Street.
00:00:03.540 It's Thursday, February the 3rd.
00:00:05.360 I'm walking through the middle of the convoy and these trucks haven't moved an inch.
00:00:10.520 They've been here for six, seven days since Friday.
00:00:13.320 They tell me they're going to have another protest this weekend and they're going to stay here for as long as it takes.
00:00:18.220 The rhetoric has been ramped up against these peaceful protesters this week.
00:00:22.740 Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson was sounding off on Twitter.
00:00:26.320 Yesterday, the Ottawa police chief was apparently considering calling in the military to handle these peaceful truckers.
00:00:33.520 I wanted to talk with some of the protesters and truckers here about their thoughts regarding the Ottawa police chief's comments.
00:00:39.300 Here's what some of them had to say.
00:00:40.500 The police chief recently said yesterday he was considering calling in the military to clean you guys up.
00:00:44.800 What do you have to say to that?
00:00:46.280 No, the military is with us because it's too nice.
00:00:50.820 People are smiling. People are happy.
00:00:52.480 It's incredible, the love that's here with everybody.
00:00:56.980 That's absolutely ridiculous.
00:00:58.340 I think it's just, we're in an information battle right now.
00:01:01.380 So I think that's kind of what's going on.
00:01:03.360 I think the mainstream media is trying to paint this as something that it's absolutely not.
00:01:07.560 It's peaceful.
00:01:08.320 I took my kids along because my husband was here and he said it's absolutely safe and peaceful for the kids to come.
00:01:15.160 So they just finished playing a game of hockey out here.
00:01:18.800 Um, let's bring it on.
00:01:21.120 We're not going anywhere.
00:01:22.920 I'm not even a trucker.
00:01:24.880 I live in a cabin.
00:01:26.200 I've escaped society.
00:01:27.320 I've escaped their rules and their regulations.
00:01:29.640 I came here for my freedom's back.
00:01:32.160 Follow in the military just so we can have some more street hockey players.
00:01:35.600 Is that what they need to bring them down here?
00:01:36.900 We can do it.
00:01:37.420 Bring jerseys.
00:01:38.200 We need jerseys.
00:01:38.720 The shift team is all we need.
00:01:40.080 But yeah, this thing is, I think this is designed, this is why Canada's doing this is because this is the most peaceful protest the world's ever seen.
00:01:47.700 The world's watching us and I think we're doing a fantastic job of showing up that we're, how proud we are to be Canadian and how peaceful we really are.
00:01:55.400 Uh, we've been here every day.
00:01:56.700 We've been up and down the streets and we've met and talked with, with literally everyone here, including the police officers.
00:02:02.920 And it's just not that type of environment.
00:02:05.900 This is the most Canadian protest you could ever imagine.
00:02:10.080 Uh, there's passion, sure.
00:02:12.100 Uh, there's freedom, freedom of speech.
00:02:14.560 Everyone's friendly and full of love.
00:02:16.260 I mean, I even got a pretty big bear hug from a fellow.
00:02:19.800 Well, we are here to, the military should be with us.
00:02:22.860 We are here to fight for our lives, for our freedom, for our families.
00:02:27.800 I know we, we are here one trucker, but behind us, there are lots of supporters, which they want this freedom back.
00:02:36.280 As you can see, most of these truckers don't know where those comments are coming from, from the Ottawa Police Chief.
00:02:41.820 All they see is a peaceful gathering of proud Canadians who just want to have their voice heard.
00:02:46.240 I caught up with Conservative MP John Barlow earlier and we chatted about what it was like as a Canadian to see this outpouring of support and this outpouring of patriotism.
00:02:55.120 Here's what he had to say.
00:02:56.000 You've been walking up and down Wellington Street, talking to constituents.
00:02:59.460 What has it been like to chat with them and, and what's the scene like from your perspective?
00:03:04.080 Well, it's incredible.
00:03:05.580 Uh, you know, to, to see the descriptions that some people are putting out that it's, uh, you know, a war zone or, it's not that at all.
00:03:11.200 This is a celebration.
00:03:12.200 This is, uh, people, um, you know, voicing their, their concerns.
00:03:16.720 This is democracy in action.
00:03:17.800 Uh, you know, I've been through here every day for the last week and everybody's been extremely courteous.
00:03:22.820 Um, you know, they've, they've got a message and they want to be heard and that's their right.
00:03:26.760 Once again, all the protesters and truckers here say they're not prepared to move an inch until Justin Trudeau and the Liberal government lifts the vaccine mandate on all Canadians.
00:03:36.100 Protests are planned for this weekend and they're going to try and keep this thing going for as long as it takes.
00:03:42.520 True North will continue to bring you coverage of the ongoing trucker protests across the country.
00:03:46.980 Reporting from Ottawa, Harrison Bulkner.