Pro-pipeline convoy of 160 vehicles nears Winnipeg

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This article was published 14/02/2019 (2772 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

With apologies to C.W. McCall for paraphrasing the lyrics to his song Convoy: Get ready, Winnipeg, we got a great big convoy coming this way Friday.

A group of about 160 semi-trucks and other vehicles will roll into the Winnipeg area around 1 p.m. Friday as it hauls its pro-pipeline message to Ottawa.

Called the United We Roll Convoy For Canada, the convoy left Red Deer, Alta., this morning with plans to arrive in Ottawa to hold rallies Tuesday and Wednesday on Parliament Hill. The focus at the rallies will be the need for pipeline building and other concerns in Canada’s oil and gas industry.

“This is all about uniting Canada. Farmers, vets (veterans), oil workers, anybody that’s got an issue with the current government, we’re going to unite and have a big rally to show our displeasure with the current government,” organizer Glen Carritt said in a telephone interview Thursday, as he travelled in the convoy.

He said the convoy will stop overnight in Regina today. The group will decide Friday morning if the convoy will travel through Winnipeg or take the perimeter around the city. 

“We may bypass it (Winnipeg). Depending on weather and if we have a little bit of extra time, we might roll through there (Winnipeg),” said Carritt, operations manager of Oilfield Paramedics Fire and Safety Inc. in Innisfail, Alta.

More participants are expected to join the convoy as it passes through Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario.

He said he expects a large turnout of people — possibly “thousands” — at the Ottawa rallies.

“The purpose is to show our concern to the current government that we oppose bill C48 and C69. We are in favour of pipelines to move our products in the oil and gas sector to the rest of Canada as well as the rest of the world. We are opposed to the current format of the carbon tax as well as the UN impact on Canadian borders,” the group’s website states.

Bill C-48 is the Oil Tanker Moratorium Act which bans large-capacity oil tankers from loading and unloading in ports along an extensive stretch of Northern B.C. coastline. Bill C-69 is the Impact Assessment Act which will impose new environmental assessments on Canada’s resource sector.

Carritt said the convoy is “a peaceful movement” and changed its name in an attempt to remove any affiliation with the yellow vest movement, although some participants were photographed wearing yellow vests. A number of movements linked to yellow vests in Canada and world-wide have become violent and turned into platforms for hate speech.

“It was a few weeks ago, it (the convoy) was Yellow Vest but there was some unprofessionalism in just that particular group so we moved into United We Roll Convoy For Canada which includes everybody. Everybody that’s peaceful can join.”

He said the United We Roll Convoy For Canada won’t be disrupting traffic as it travels and will allow for space on the highway for vehicles to pass.

ashley.prest@freepress.mb.ca