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‘Tens of thousands of people’ have turned out to supports truckers in Canada who have formed a ‘Freedom Convoy’ to protest against new laws mandating vaccine passports for lorry drivers.
Some reports suggest as many as 50,000 truckers are taking part and that the convoy is 70 km – or 43 miles – long. However, other reports and fact-checking websites suggest this figure is hugely exaggerated.
Adrian Ghobrial, a reporter for the Toronto news outlet City News, said: “There’s thousands of cars and SUVs here but you’d be hard pressed to find 100 trucks.”
“By my estimate, tens of thousands of people have descended on Vaughan Mills to support the ‘freedom convoy’.
And Global News correspondent David Akin said: “OPP [Ontario Provincial Police] report convoy that arrived THU in Thunder Bay from Winnipeg consisted of 113 commercial vehicles (trucks) and 276 personal vehicles (pickups, SUVs, cars).”
US truckers are also said to have joined their Canadian counterparts in the “Freedom Convoy’ across the giant North American country.
However, Reuters ‘fact checkers’ have said some videos purporting to show showing truck drivers from South Carolina heading to join a protest convoy in Canada “was in fact filmed in August 2021 and shows a convoy held in support of the South Carolina Special Olympics”.
Nonetheless, The Toronto Sun has reported that an estimated 50,000 Canadian lorry drivers are travelling to Ottawa – and that Benjamin Dichter, spokesman for the Freedom Convoy 2022, says the convoy is 70 km – or 43 miles – long.
The truckers are heading the capital to the south-east of the nation, in protest of vaccine mandates – or vaccine passports – for truckers, with up to 20 per cent of their colleagues in the country unvaccinated.
This could potentially stop truckers from crossing the US-Canada border without proof of being jabbed.
Truckers left from British Columbia on Sunday and will be met in the nation’s capital tomorrow (Saturday) by other protesters driving from the east and the south of the country.
Justin Trudeau, the Canadian prime minister has reportedly described the protesters as a “small fringe minority” who do not have widely-held views.
And a joint statement from the Government and the Canadian Trucking Alliance president Stephen Laskowski said “the government of Canada and the Canadian Trucking Alliance both agree that vaccination, used in combination with preventative public health measures, is the most effective tool to reduce the risk of COVID-19 for Canadians, and to protect public health”.
But Bob Zimmer, an MP for Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies, said in a statement: “My wife Val and I honked and waved on Sunday to show our support for our local truckers as they took to the road to protest the newly-imposed truckers’ mandate by Justin Trudeau.
“Imposed at a time when we are already seeing supply chain shortages and skyrocketing inflation, the prime minister is imposing a mandate that will leave tens of thousands of truckers unable to work and puts our food security at risk.”
“Conservatives have always supported Canadian’s right to determine their own health choices. For those who are unvaccinated, we continue to believe in responsible measures, such as rapid testing, to help protect everyone, especially the most vulnerable.”
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