Thread: New impaired driving laws Canada

Great point about the mixed message Tom!

Originally Posted by sharptonn

That's nuckin futs!
Home for 2 hours having a drink or 20 and they can come in and arrest you because you drove within two hours beforehand?
AND pot is legal!

Dang old Big Brother! He knows how to control folks! Attachment 300735

Impaired driving laws cover impairment by drugs and lack of sleep as well as alcohol. Don't worry, Canadian police are trialing drug testing gear. Chances are you won't be safe there either.

The trick with the 2 hours after bit apparently is that you have to prove how much you had before arrival home and after not the police proving you were impaired while driving previous to arriving home. Can you imagine the cost of hiring a certified expert to testify what your blood alcohol level was while driving pervious to arriving home. The onus is on the accused now not the police as before.

Bob

................

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PLC_cBJwk4&app=desktop

A frog in a pot of heating water... keeps coming to mind.
At what point will it be too late to jump out? These types of encroachments come slow and steady, but usually not enough to excite action.
And then we are used to it, and ready for more restrictions.
Errr no, not restrictions that's too 1984, I meant to say guidance! Hehehe

TBH, I hope a tool to be used when a plate comes-up in a hit and run or reckless driving complaint comes-in.
Hopefully that is it. Your car did this as if you were impaired....Same thing here, really.
They CAN do pretty much what they want. When they want. Like it or not.

Originally Posted by MikeT

A frog in a pot of heating water... keeps coming to mind.
At what point will it be too late to jump out? These types of encroachments come slow and steady, but usually not enough to excite action.
And then we are used to it, and ready for more restrictions.
Errr no, not restrictions that's too 1984, I meant to say guidance! Hehehe

Yup, I have seen that happen with another subject that can't be mentioned here. That slow change took about 40 years to get to where it is today.

The same thing has happened with impaired driving laws over about the same period of time. In both cases it is a matter of taking a good thing and going one step too far imo. People just don't seem to know at what point doing more of the same is counter productive. That is giving people the benefit of the doubt.

Bob

Forget about that naive book 1984.

Did any of you read yesterday about Amazon Ring allowing all its employees unfettered access to ALL of its customers Ring feeds? Co-workers even used customer's Ring cameras to spy on fellow co-workers dating and other childish fun. All Ring video feeds are stored unsecured. You only need one bad actor to turn this into more of an actual scandal. And wait 'til they get the facial recognition developed so that they can sell some wonderfully advanced products to the military or to the goons in blue.

And any of you running Alexa devices in your home while viewing your 23-and-me results? It just gets better and better....

I don’t mind giving police the ability to test drivers. It’s that after the fact testing that is problematic. No one should have to prove their innocence in a democracy.

It is hard to understand how the wording of the legislation made it through multiple readings of the bill in both Houses of Parliament without raising red flags - the lawyers in those seats must have been having lunch. It seems a no brainer that it will be challenged on constitutional grounds, but some poor soul will have to foot the bill and go through the process and it will likely take a year or longer.

Originally Posted by DZEC

I don’t mind giving police the ability to test drivers. It’s that after the fact testing that is problematic. No one should have to prove their innocence in a democracy.

It is hard to understand how the wording of the legislation made it through multiple readings of the bill in both Houses of Parliament without raising red flags - the lawyers in those seats must have been having lunch. It seems a no brainer that it will be challenged on constitutional grounds, but some poor soul will have to foot the bill and go through the process and it will likely take a year or longer.

The police have always had the power to demand a breathalyzer but they needed reasonable and probable grounds to demand one. They now can make that demand without having any suspicion that you are impaired.

In a democracy police need a valid reason to stop you when on foot or driving from continuing on your lawful way unimpeded. They no longer need to have a valid reason. It could be considered a form of "carding" because of that. As always, failure to comply with a demand for a breath sample carries the same penalty as being impaired so refusing to do basically means an automatic criminal record. The 2 hour bit is the icing on that cake.

Bob

Almost forgot that it is likely this change was included in an Omnibus Bill when it was presented to Parliament. That is that it was probably buried in a Bill that contained many other changes to a variety of unrelated subjects.

Originally Posted by Speedster

Forget about that naive book 1984.

It was written in 1949. Hardly naive.