Quebec\u2019s 300 traffic controllers could be carrying firearms after a government source revealed to Le Journal de Montr\u00e9al that the province\u2019s Transport Minister is preparing to authorize their use \u2013 an official announcement is expected in the coming days.<\/p>\n
This would mean that these officers who monitor the road transportation of passengers and goods could be carrying firearms as early as 2026.<\/p>\n
This comes as traffic controllers have been confined to roadside checkpoints since last March since the Administrative Labour Tribunal ruled that these workers face danger in the course of their work.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have four accidents that people rush with a vehicle and try to hit a member. We have some of our members seize fire arms, shotgun or something like that. We never got a deceased, but we have many, many injured,\u201d said Jean-Claude Daignault, the president of Fraternit\u00e9 des constables du contr\u00f4le routier du Qu\u00e9bec.<\/p>\n
Andr\u00e9 Durocher, the director of road safety with CAA-Quebec, says, \u201cOver the years having worked in the transport industry and also in the police. The work has evolved. We see that there\u2019s a lot of, you know, there\u2019s contraband, there\u2019s people carrying. For example, we saw stolen vehicles being carried by a truck. So it\u2019s important for these traffic controllers to be able to intercept these people that are not always law abiding citizens. It could represent some dangers for them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
The president of the traffic controllers\u2019 union suggests that it will likely take two to three weeks of additional training to use a firearm before they could return to patrolling Quebec\u2019s highways and roads, and that their members could use a gun in situations where there is a threat to their safety from other drivers.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Concordia University professor Ted Rutland who studies violence in policing says that this is an unfortunate decision and that a society with more firearms is a more dangerous one.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think that we can point to many situations on our society where people are confronted with dangerous situations. We can think of security guards, teachers, nurses, and doctors, etc. And the principle that we operate by is that we don\u2019t want everyone in our society to be armed. If you need a weapon, you can call the police. And so this, I think, is an unfortunate situation where we\u2019re evolving from a situation where a street or traffic controllers used to have to call the police if they encountered a dangerous situation. Now they\u2019re going to be armed,\u201d said Rutland.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The anticipated announcement to allow traffic controllers to carry guns comes after it was announced earlier this month that Quebec\u2019s chief coroner ordered a public inquiry into fatal collisions involving heavy trucks.<\/p>\n
The CEO for Quebec\u2019s Trucking Association (ACQ) is not opposed to traffic controllers carrying guns and suggests that their return to patrolling roads could improve safety.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want them back because we\u2019ve all lived the last months with the far west that we\u2019re living right now on the roads, with illegal drivers, with non-conform drivers, with unfit drivers to drive. So we think that obviously, contr\u00f4leurs routiers du Qu\u00e9bec has to be back as soon as possible,\u201d said Marc Cadieux, the CEO of ACQ.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve sincerely asked the minister to put this on a fast track. And his words were to me last week that this was a top priority for him on his desk.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Quebec\u2019s 300 traffic controllers could be carrying firearms after a government source revealed to Le Journal de Montr\u00e9al…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":87768,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[242,85,46,141],"class_list":["post-87767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/87768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}