The Toronto G20 Summit

The BBQ Pit
1

I’m not sure how this has managed to avoid becoming a thread so far, but I couldn’t find one through a perusal of GD, the Pit, or a quick search, so I’m making one.

This year’s G20 summit is taking place in the Metro Toronto Convention Center. For those of you unfamiliar with the city, this building is right downtown, literally next door to the CN tower and Rogers Center (aka the Skydome). In order to make the event “safe” for visiting world leaders, the RCMP in conjunction with the OPP, the Toronto police, the Canadian military, and police officers from forces throughout the country, have put several city blocks of downtown Toronto under complete lockdown behind a three-meter-tall “unclimbable” security fence.

Furthermore, we’ve now learned that the Ontario Legislature has secretly passed a law, without parliamentary debate, tucked into a different bill. It allows police to arrest anyone who refuses to provide identification, even if they’re not within the security zone. This law hasn’t even been officially published, and won’t be until July 3 – a week after it is no longer even in effect. The regulation hadn’t even been announced until after arrests had been made. Hell, they’ve also arrested a computer programmer (known in his neighbourhood for his house’s lush garden) for having fertilizer in his garage.

They have also set up a “designated protest zone” in Queen’s Park – a whole 2.3 kilometers (1.4 miles) from the conference site. Even tomorrow’s protest march (in which I will be a participant) will be stopped 1.1 km from the convention by a line of riot-gear-clad police. There will be twenty thousand police, to control an estimated ten thousand protestors. Two cops for every civilian.

Tanks at Pearson Airport, random searches, Berlin Walls… when did my country become a police state? And that’s not even considering its cost. The tab for this atrocity? I have no idea. The security alone is estimated to cost a billion dollars. A billion dollars for three days! Every five seconds, my government spends enough to give an unemployed person a job for an entire year. A vastly inflated security cost, the majority of which is being spent to secure the central core of a major city, with innumerable access points. A brand new building could have been built on an army base for far less than that.

My government would rather build a fake lake just two blocks from one of the world’s largest real ones; it would rather sit comfortably in its CN tower, looking down on the unemployed, unfortunate ants below, wondering why those without bread don’t just eat some cake. The billion dollars spent this weekend could alter countless lives for the better; instead it is wasted, giving some police officers a fat overtime cheque. They already have jobs! What it must be like to be so lucky. This from a government elected on its promises of fiscal responsibility.

This entire summit is a disaster, for freedom of speech, for freedom of assembly, and for a financially unsound country’s fiscal portfolio. I will be there protesting today (June 26). And there won’t be enough of us.

2

I don’t really understand why they keep having these big international meetings in major cities, as rightly or wrongly they’ve become a flash-point for protesters for every imaginable cause, and while I realize most attend to protest peacefully, there’s obviously a sizable element that’s there more for the recreational vandalism then any higher purpose. And its been that way for at least a decade, the “battle in Seattle” was in 1999.

Reportedly, most of the actual agreements are reached ahead of time anyways. I don’t really get why they don’t just have the bigwigs meet in some easily securable mountain resort (Bretton Woods, for example), and thus save themselves a billion dollars and the PR cost of having a bunch of tense police/protester clashes every year.

3

The biggest issue is the futility of these events. As you say, these agreements are largely written ahead of time, with little or no reason for a face to face conference. Canada hosted a conference at the much more easily secured mountain resort at Kananaskis in 2002, but even the cost of that is too much when it is for a completely unnecessary meeting. This entire fiasco can be replaced by video conferencing at a fraction of the cost.

4

We have the technology available to ensure that these self-important pricks in charge of our future, never have to leave the office for their get-togethers, so I can only guess that someone wants these flashpoints to occur, in order to prove some kind of point about those that are protesting. Maybe they are just getting a feel for how many activist types they are up against?

5

Maybe. I’m willing to believe that theres some value in having the various big-wigs of the major economies meet face to face every year or so. Just from my own experience, I spend a decent amount of my time collaborating with people in other States and countries, and technically we could do it all through email/video-conferencing, but it turns out to be worthwhile to actually arrange for face-to-face meetings once a year. Plus this way we get those funny group pictures of the various world leaders in whatever the ridiculous looking native costume is.

But there’s no reason to inconvenience a large metropolitan area a blow through a half a percent of Canada’s Federal budget to do so.

6

Military commanders wouldn’t need or want to have pre-announced meetings to discuss future policy, so why is it deemed necessary for their civilian counterparts? This sort of event is just an invitation for the crazies to try and fuck some shit up, as street parlance would put it.

7

I’m sure there’s some value in having face time with people you actually have to work fairly closely with. World leaders don’t really fall into that category; they don’t work closely with each other. The real work of hashing out agreements is handled by underlings. And those underlings don’t need a billion dollars worth of security when they meet. Make the leaders stay at home.

8

For freedom of peaceable assembly. You seem to be forgetting whose fault this big security hubbub is, and why.

Like everything, it’s the assholes ruining it for everyone. If people protested peaceably (which they are legally allowed to do), there wouldn’t be these security measures.

9

But these “underlings” are skilled technical people. They aren’t political government lackeys, they’re very pricey financial analysts, economists, and so on working in very technical discusions. Moreover, they’re probably going from conference to conference and may not know what they will be doing late on day 1, much less day 2 or 3. While video conferencing is nice, it’s not so secure or flexible - the biggest security is that pople usually don’t know about it or care. Does it suck? Maybe. But it’s hardly an insane iea to get people together for any realy important conference. Video conferencing is more convenient, but vastly les productive.

10

You can’t do blow off a hooker’s tits via video conference, Silly!

11

Let’s not forget that there are arseholes on the security forces side too, who are just dying to test out their new batons. The actions of some of those cops on duty would provoke the most Gandhi-esque protester into wanting to fight back.

12

So if everyone was just sitting there holding up a sign, not pushing against the police, not calling the police cuss words, not foaming at the mouth, etc. your contention is that the police would do something to incite hate?

13

If you want to protest, do it in the voting booth. I have zero sympathy for a bunch of unemployed, uneducated gits who think that smashing store fronts and hurdling rocks at people is in any way meaningful.

You protesting idiots is why the rest of the working citizens are being fleeced for this security bill. Get a hair cut and a real job. And yes, get the fuck off my lawn too.

By the way, what in the name of fuck are you protesting against? Globalization? What the fuck is that? If by globalization you mean bringing jobs to parts of the world where few exist, then what exactly is the problem with that? Perhaps because the biggest question you get to ask on a daily basis is “Do you want fries with that?”

14

Not just the taxpayer’s bill for the costs of the summit, but I’m really curious about the costs to businesses in lost productivity. Virtually the entire financial district was shut down for Thursday and Friday. I had an appointment cancelled at a downtown hospital because they closed on Friday. The cost is much greater, I think, that just what we’re seeing allotted to the summit itself.

And I bet all the security cameras that have been installed aren’t coming back down again. Welcome to a surveilled society. And that super-double-top-secret law, passed in secret with no debate in the legislature (with no plans on announcing it to the public until two weeks after it has expired) and that can get you actual prison time, should get someone bounced out of political office. I’m horrified by the draconian bullshit law and I’m glad the first guy arrested is making a Charter challenge.

15

I love the draconian bullshit. Arrest them all. Send them to Guantanamo Bay, or Sudbury.

16

I agree wholeheartedly. I love how our esteemed OP says “why do they have to spend so much money on police, OMG!” and then says “I’m going to the protests myself.” OP, you are part of the problem. They are spending billions because of you.

17

Sudbury? No need to be inhumane!

18

And on top of all that shit, goddamn Obama is pressuring us to crank up on the deficit spending, pawing off our children’s future for cheap Chinese plastic brick-a-brack. Stellar idea there Ob-man, lets pretend Greece doesn’t exists and Spain isn’t tottering and Labour hasn’t completely bankrupted Britain.

19

For anybody who is interested, the regulation in question is Ontario Regulation 233/10, Designation of Public Works.

It was published on Ontario’s E-Laws website on June 16, 2010, and came into force on June 21; both of which dates are clearly stated in the regulation. As with any law or regulation, the “coming into force” date is what matters, not the date it is published in the Ontario Gazette or is otherwise announced.

Also important is the fact that it is a regulation; that is, a piece of legislation that is subordinate to an existing law. A regulation is not a law, nor is it something “tucked into a different bill.” In this case, Ontario Regulation 233/10, Designation of Public Works, is a regulation of the Public Works Protection Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. P.55.

In terms of provincial legislation, regulations “put the finer points” to their respective laws. For example, the Highway Traffic Act prohibits speeding (general), but a regulation to that Act sets out the exact amount of the fines (specific). Because the matters that regulations deal with are usually too small to require the Legislature’s attention (imagine the delays that would occur if the Legislature had to debate individual speeding fines), regulations are not passed by the Legislature; but rather made by the Lieutenant Governor in Council, a Minister or an agency. This is not unusual; and is specifically provided for in Ontario’s Legislation Act, 2006, S.O. 2006, c. 21 , Sched. F.

Regardless of the spin that is being put on this regulation (passed in secret, not published, etc.), it doesn’t seem to me that anything out of the ordinary was done here. Thought I’d throw all this information out there, in the interest of fighting ignorance.

20

Dude - all this actual information is totally harshing the OPs buzz. Why do you have ruin a perfectly good rant, based on nothing more than paranoid bullshit with actual facts. Jeez.