Prime Minister Justin Trudeau misled the Canadian public about the country’s state of readiness in preparing to reopen the economy from the COVID-19 pandemic, says Blacklock’s Reporter..Internal emails obtained by Blacklock’s Reporter show Trudeau on Tuesday, June 9 said federal agencies were fully prepared for any reopening of the economy with plentiful pandemic supplies..“As we start to reopen and some people head back to work, the need for personal protective equipment and other essential supplies like hand sanitizer and disinfectant will continue to grow,” he told reporters in a nationally-televised appearance..“We’re making sure we’re ready for that. On Saturday a ship carrying 160,000 litres of hand sanitizer arrived in Vancouver and we’re expecting seven more ships with hand sanitizer in the coming days.”.But internal records showed federal agencies in fact had only 31,998 litres of hand sanitizer in stock, and that four shiploads were due for delivery, not seven..“We’ve also have almost a million face shields,” boasted Trudeau..Records at the time indicated only 100,000 face shields were ordered with “600 received.”.Staff in the Department of Public Works suggested they “try and talk around it” in case anyone noticed..Political aides in the public works department lamented Trudeau’s announcement..“Oh dear,” wrote James Fitz-Morris, director of communications:.“The Prime Minister publicly said on Tuesday that 160,000 litres of hand sanitizer had just arrived by boat.”.Staff emails detailed attempts to conceal the true extent of the stockpile..“If journalists ask we can say that due to an issue with inventorying this week our update will be postponed until next week,” wrote Fitz-Morris..“We will try to nail down (hopefully) a reason for this backlog as well. Maybe we can say they focused on distribution this week and will resume inventorying deliveries next week (assuming that is true).”.Fitz-Morris in a email a week later on June 18 encouraged aides to conceal figures from the Opposition..“We aren’t going to have reliable numbers in time for the critics’ call,” he wrote..“Can it be postponed with an explanation that we are changing reporting methods and want to ensure the new numbers are accurate? Or do we want to try and talk around it again in the hopes that, it being the last sitting day, they don’t actually care that much?”. Trudeau misled country on pandemic readiness with masks and sanitizer .Other political aides suggested creative use of phrases to obscure ongoing shortages of pandemic supplies..One policy advisor suggested “a new metric to distract somewhat from unattractive delivery numbers.”.“Instead of ‘received’ we recommend to use ‘secured,’” said one Department of Public Works memo..“The rationale behind it is that we have ‘ordered’ more than 2 billion items, but have ‘received’ 820.8 million pieces. Yesterday the Minister used the word ‘secured.’”.Cecely Roy, a press secretary to the Minister of Public Works, suggested other wording..“My first question and the one that will be the most difficult to explain to reporters will be the definition of ‘quantities shipped’,” wrote Roy..“I think it would make more sense to use terms like ‘quantities delivered’ and ‘quantities delivered subject to testing.’ The difficult part of this remains how we explain the difference between the two.”.Leslie Church, chief of staff to the public works minister, warned in an April 6, 2020 email the department could never “get away with” inflating figures on masks, gowns and other medical supplies..“I don’t think we’re going to get away with giving the big order numbers without more evidence of deliveries or what’s been going out to provinces,” wrote Church..“The tone is, ‘We’re doing a ton of work but I know we’re nowhere near done and big challenges remain.”.Dave Naylor is the News Editor of the Western Standard.dnaylor@westernstandardonline.com.Twitter.com/nobby7694
