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OTTAWA (LifeSiteNews) – The author of Canada’s Emergencies Act (EA) himself directly warned a top Canadian minister that the use of extraordinary measures against the trucker Freedom Convoy would result in a host of “long-term issues.”

As per Blacklock’s Reporter, EA author Perrin Beatty in text message exchanges with Canadian Minister of Finance Chrystia Freeland on February 22 said he was concerned about what using the EA meant for a future Canada.

“I am worried as I know you are,” Beatty wrote in his message to Freeland.

“There are also lots of long-term issues we need to consider once this is over including whether we need to take other measures that could obviate the need to use the extraordinary powers in the Act in the future and how to repair holes in our political system.”

Freeland was asked about the text message exchanges with Beatty last Thursday during her testimony before the Public Order Emergency Commission.

Beatty added that he was “particularly concerned” about the “radicalization of people who would normally be law-abiding and focused on going about their daily lives.”

The EA was enacted on February 14 by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The text message exchanges between Beatty and Freeland were made public last week during testimony at the Public Order Emergency Commission.

Freeland offered no comments about the text messages but said she thought of Beatty as “someone whose collaboration I really value.”

In March, Beatty said Trudeau’s use of the EA to quell the trucker Freedom Convoy set in place a bad precedent.

“Emergencies legislation is designed to be legislation of last resort,” Beatty said.

Beatty served as a cabinet minister throughout the 1980s under Progressive Conservative Party Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.

On February 14, the day the EA was invoked and only a day after a call with bank CEOs, Freeland mandated certain bank accounts be frozen under the EA. In total, nearly $8 million in funds from 267 people were locked. Additionally, 170 bitcoin wallets were frozen.

During Freeland’s testimony before the Commission last Thursday, she claimed that freezing people’s bank accounts was needed as a form of an “economic incentive” to get Freedom Convoy protesters to leave.

During testimony at the Public Order Emergency Commission, it was revealed that Canadian Justice Minister and Attorney General David Lametti and Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino made jokes about using the Canadian military to stop the Freedom Convoy.

While Trudeau ultimately revoked the EA on February 23, the ability for the government to direct banks to freeze the accounts of citizens without a court order led to immense backlash by civil rights groups and others.

Last Friday, Trudeau, while testifying before the Commission, admitted the Freedom Convoy was not violent but said enacting the EA was needed.

The hearings into Trudeau’s unprecedented use of the EA to crush the Freedom Convoy began October 13 and concluded last Friday.

The Public Order Emergency Commission will begin a pubic policy phase to recommend potential amendments to existing legislation related to the Freedom Convoy this week, a process that includes roundtables of “experts.”

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