[mikewood86]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

DrCaleb DrCaleb:

Annihilator Annihilator:

Why the hell would anyone mind taking a little test if he's not drunk? I'm no gonna go crazy about our rights being direspected for something that insignificant, if it can get rid of a few drunk drivers, I don't see anything wrong.

Why would anyone mind taking this little urine test, if they have no drugs in their system?

Why would anyone mind taking this little blood test, if they have never had unprotected sex?

You don't mind a little DNA test, to check for genetic abnormalities that might become health problems in the future, do you?

Why would anyone mind providing their banking information, you aren't laundering money are you?

Where does it end?

Exactly. In and of itself, it's not much, but every one of these little prohibitions or new police powers is just another tiny little shackle on our freedom.

Bascically what this means is that a cop can pull you over any time for no reason. Just for the heck of it. No big whup unless you're under 30, have long hair, drive a muscle car, listen to hip hop or otherwise stray from the norm.

I think that it would have to be mandated to only include programs like R.I.D.E. and not just for police on patrol. They would still have to have a reasonable cause to perform a breathalyzer and this cause could be shown from their dashboard cameras in court.

Like I said before, the article says the charter does allow for constraints on rights when they are deemed reasonable, and saying we will lose all our freedoms or way of life (drunk driving is a way of life?) is completely unreasonable.

[Lemmy]

The Charter is pretty clear about our rights against unreasonable search and detention (Sections 8 & 9). There's no way that random breathalzyer tests would pass the Oakes test at the Supreme Court level. I suggest reading the case of R. v. Ladouceur. That was the case that upheld the constitutionality of R.I.D.E. programs. That BARELY passed the Oakes test. The Supreme Court, in fact, AGREED with Ladouceur that R.I.D.E. was a violation of Section 9 but allowed the program to remain in place on the grounds that stopping a car and asking "Have you had anything to drink in the past 12 hours?" was not a significant violation of Section 9. They ruled that way because asking such a question detains a person for a few seconds. Performing breathalyzer tests takes several minutes. If a positive test is recorded, they have to wait 15 minutes and test again. That is enough of an intrusion to fail the Oakes test, in my opinion.

Furthermore, actually bringing forth a program such as this, which is so OBVIOUSLY unconstitutional would be political suicide. Any government attempting to implement this would be voted out at earliest opportunity...and rightfully so. The slippery slope created by such a Charter Rights violation as this is frightening to ponder.

[mikewood86]

Yeah I just read up for myself on Section 8 and 9.

Section 8 is a little sketchy for this situation, but section 9 is pretty clear...

"The provision is invoked in the criminal law context generally where a police officer who stops, detains, arrests or otherwise restrains a suspect without reasonable grounds."

Key words being reasonable grounds, so that throws random out the window. Section 1 is an interesting read. Thanks for that Lemmy.

[rawmeat]

Check stops already happen and for good reason. That is enough. I don't understand why you would need the new regulation. We already have check stops, are they worried that there a bunch of people going through them that have no signs of drinking? I don't understand the point of this. Isn't a check stop already a random check?

[herbie]

Ooh what a handy little law. They'd get guys like me who say Fuck You, I don't drink so I'm not blowing nothing... and they'd be able to jail you and fine you for refusing to take a breathalyzer and take your car away.
No problem with that, eh?

Told you Harper knows dick shit about law, they want to replace it with their brand of "justice".

[Annihilator]

herbie herbie:

Ooh what a handy little law. They'd get guys like me who say Fuck You, I don't drink so I'm not blowing nothing... and they'd be able to jail you and fine you for refusing to take a breathalyzer and take your car away.
No problem with that, eh?

Told you Harper knows dick shit about law, they want to replace it with their brand of "justice".

Are you that good and your time worth so much that you can't fucking blow in a machine for a few seconds in order to make our roads safer?

Wow, you must be an incredible person, above the common mortals for sure.

[Proculation]

herbie herbie:

Ooh what a handy little law. They'd get guys like me who say Fuck You, I don't drink so I'm not blowing nothing... and they'd be able to jail you and fine you for refusing to take a breathalyzer and take your car away.
No problem with that, eh?

Told you Harper knows dick shit about law, they want to replace it with their brand of "justice".

I just saw on the night news, it seems not only the tories agree: the LPC and Bloc too. So it should not have too much problem to pass. Nothing said about the constitutionality of that law. The news was even quite biased FOR it... wtf ?

[ridenrain]

I was hoping this was just hollow promises to a special intrest group..

[Lemmy]

Annihilator Annihilator:

Are you that good and your time worth so much that you can't fucking blow in a machine for a few seconds in order to make our roads safer?

Wow, you must be an incredible person, above the common mortals for sure.

We can add Section 11(d) to the list of Charter Rights being trampled on by this idea.

[mikewood86]

Proculation Proculation:

herbie herbie:

Ooh what a handy little law. They'd get guys like me who say Fuck You, I don't drink so I'm not blowing nothing... and they'd be able to jail you and fine you for refusing to take a breathalyzer and take your car away.
No problem with that, eh?

Told you Harper knows dick shit about law, they want to replace it with their brand of "justice".

I just saw on the night news, it seems not only the tories agree: the LPC and Bloc too. So it should not have too much problem to pass. Nothing said about the constitutionality of that law. The news was even quite biased FOR it... wtf ?

...and the NDP.

[Zipperfish]

mikewood86 mikewood86:

I think that it would have to be mandated to only include programs like R.I.D.E. and not just for police on patrol. They would still have to have a reasonable cause to perform a breathalyzer and this cause could be shown from their dashboard cameras in court.

Like I said before, the article says the charter does allow for constraints on rights when they are deemed reasonable, and saying we will lose all our freedoms or way of life (drunk driving is a way of life?) is completely unreasonable.

Another might argue that giving cops carte blanche to pull you over and arrest you anytime you are in a car for no reason is unreasonable.

Another problem with this rather obvious intrusion on the rights of individuals is that I have not seen any stats to support it. I heard a spokesperson from Mothers Against Drunk Driving today, who bandied about some numbers, but when the reporter asked where the numbers were from, the guy got dodgy. MADD is a prohibition organization, so they're not exactly objective on the issue of alcohol.

Are drunk driving deaths going up or down? We've been hitting this thing pretty hard now for at least twenty years--somebody must be keeping stats.

[Scape]

$1:

Murie said its biggest selling point is that it improves road safety, with drunk driving fatalities dropping 36 per cent in Australia after legislation was introduced, and 23 per cent in Ireland when it made the change.

Isn't that a stat worth find out more about? I think there are civil rights issues here just like photo radar, but isn't the fact that people who choose to drive drunk mostly look sober a most of the time and that it is a habit that develops over time? Wouldn't this being on the books catch some but give a whole lot more a reason not to pick up the habit to begun with do so because there is a realistic chance they might get caught?

We can't set speed traps in the pub's parking lot or stake out the beer gardens with cops but we can set up roadside checks can't we? The cost of the equipment may be expensive but if it drives down DD by 20-40% then the trade off that some cops might abuse power sounds like a reasonable tradeoff.

[Lemmy]

Scape Scape:

Isn't that a stat worth find out more about? I think there are civil rights issues here just like photo radar, but isn't the fact that people who choose to drive drunk mostly look sober a most of the time and that it is a habit that develops over time? Wouldn't this being on the books catch some but give a whole lot more a reason not to pick up the habit to begun with do so because there is a realistic chance they might get caught?

We can't set speed traps in the pub's parking lot or stake out the beer gardens with cops but we can set up roadside checks can't we? The cost of the equipment may be expensive but if it drives down DD by 20-40% then the trade off that some cops might abuse power sounds like a reasonable tradeoff.

In a word "no". I cannot support ANY policy that would expand the power of the government to perform random searches on a FREE and DEMOCRATIC society. PERIOD.

[travior]

I have no problem with it as long as the cops are properly trained and know that there is always a chance of a false-positive. Google it. It happens. Apparently you can blow a false positive within 15 minutes of eating normal foods like ice cream and bread, etc.

The local cops were running a "license check" in town a couple of years ago. I passed through it in a few different locations in town multiple times over a couple of months. They were running it at 1am and that just happened to be the time I went through town on my way home from work.

Actually had one of them appologise for stopping me so often but said that they had been very successful in catching a lot of illegal drugs and weapons over the time they ran it. As long as it is doing good, and I am not trying to hide anything, I'm okay with it.

As far as the house vs car argument, roads are public property. When you are on a public road you no longer have the same level of privacy as on your own property. I would rather it be a secondary law, however. (Not sure if there is a Canadian equivalent however - here we have primary and secondary traffic laws. A secondary one can only be charged against you if you were stopped for violating a primary one. i.e.: Seat belt usage used to be a secondary law). If they were only allowed to randomly test after stopping you for another violation (speeding, etc.) I think there would be less objection to it.

[Chumley]

This better not go through. No different than randomly checking your house for grow ops.