Mounties' union says allowing trucks to park near Parliament was a mistake, Emergencies Act inquiry docs show

The union representing RCMP members says the decision to allow heavy trucks to park near the parliamentary precinct as part of last winter's convoy protests in Ottawa posed an unacceptable risk, according to documents tabled with the Emergencies Act inquiry.

Lawyers with the Public Order Emergency Commission interviewed two members of the National Police Federation in the summer, ahead of official hearings currently underway.

Both Dennis Miller, a 29-year veteran of the force on leave to serve as vice-president of the federation, and Steve Madden, a board member with the group who previously served with the RCMP for 16 years, including with the Parliamentary Protective Services unit, liaised with commanders and other members during the convoy protests.

A summary of their joint interview was recently entered into evidence.

Both men raised concerns about allowing the self-described Freedom Convoy protesters to park near the parliamentary precinct.

"Mr. Madden observed that placing heavy fuel trucks near Parliament Hill posed an unacceptable risk because of the potential for those trucks to explode, whether by accident or design," reads a summary of the interview.

Miller told the commission's lawyers that he had policed G20 summits where the RCMP had directed protesters to park away from the central location and then arranged for buses to transport people to the protest site.

Former Ottawa police chief Peter Sloly has testified that he did not think he had the legal standing under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms to prevent protesters from parking their trucks and other vehicles downtown.

"I'm a police officer, not a lawyer," he testified on Friday.

The need for more RCMP officers was almost immediately apparent after the convoy rolled into town on Jan. 28.

The two RCMP union reps said that by Jan. 30, the head of the force's national division declared a state of emergency.

Under the RCMP's collective agreement, a state of emergency allows the RCMP to redeploy members and temporarily waive scheduling and maximum work hours provisions to ensure public safety and delivery of policing services.

Miller said he was told that assistant commissioner Ches Parsons decided to declare an emergency "because he had exhausted RCMP assets and resources based in the National Division."

Sloly was asking publicly for roughly 1,800 extra officers to bolster the Ottawa police response, including hundreds from the RCMP.