Frustrated Vancouver Island commercial truck drivers — and their supporters — voiced their opposition to a vaccine mandate for commercial truck drivers who cross back into the country at the Canadian border by driving from Campbell River to Victoria on Sunday.
“The borders are being shut down to truckers. Those who even have passports, have to go into quarantine for two weeks,” said Troy Lambert, who organized the Vancouver Island convoy. “This isn’t letting food into our country and supplies that we’re needing every day.”
The convoy was part of what is being called a “Freedom Convoy” that left Delta Sunday morning and is headed to Ottawa in an attempt to get the Trudeau government to change a cross-border policy for truckers — something the federal government appears unwilling to do.
“We’re here to support the truckers and hopefully, the truckers are going to stop Trudeau and the madness and the mandates for all Canadians,” said Jed Ferguson in Courtenay.
The truckers oppose the federal government’s rule that came into effect last weekend which forces unvaccinated truckers to quarantine for 14 days after coming into Canada. The U.S. has a similar law for truck drivers entering the United States.
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However, Sunday’s convoy on Vancouver Island only saw a handful of commercial trucks followed by dozens of other vehicles full of supporters drive from Campbell River to Victoria.
“I’m not anti-anything, I’m just in support of Canadians having the freedom to do what you want,” said Susan, a supporter in Bowser who refused to provide her last name.
“The mandates affect our lives every day,” said another protester in Courtenay. “It affects where we can go, what we can do, people are losing their jobs, people are losing friends.”
Lambert said the event has nothing to do with vaccinated or unvaccinated people, but to do with supply chain shortages.
“This has nothing to do with who’s being jabbed and not being jabbed, this is all about what’s happening here with our food supply and shortages,” he said.
Giancarlo Trimarchi, chair of the Canadian Federation of Independent Grocers, said while grocers started noticing a reduced supply of certain items “about a week” or so ago, images of empty shelves are being hyped — and Canada’s food supply generally remains in good shape.
He said the current supply issues might result in some products, such as certain brands, becoming temporarily unavailable, but they’re unlikely to cause widespread shortages.
Meanwhile, the Canadian Trucking Alliance and the American Trucking Association say up to 26,000 of the 160,000 drivers who make regular trips across the Canada-U.S. border would likely be sidelined as a result of the vaccine mandate in both countries.
According to the CTA, the majority of truckers in Canada are vaccinated with numbers similar to the general population — 90 per cent — and did try and lobby the federal government to make truckers exempt from the mandate.
But in a statement on its website, the CTA said they do not support the protests.
“The Canadian Trucking Alliance does not support and strongly disapproves of any protests on public roadways highways and bridges. CTA believes such actions especially those that interfere with public safety are not how disagreements with government policies should be expressed,” the statement reads, adding. “The only way to cross the border in a commercial truck or any other vehicle is to get vaccinated.”
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Dean Stoltz
