(Quebec) Public Security Minister François Bonnardel corrects the situation and says his government does not intend to consider the suspension of the driver’s license for certain people who are diagnosed with a mental health disorder. He had mentioned this strategy to protect the population against cases of “deadly madness”, such as the one that took place in Amqui on Monday.
“I thought out loud this morning. Don’t get me wrong, we are not undertaking an exercise in government following this, “he said at a press briefing in Amqui.
In the morning, in an interview with Radio-Canada, Mr. Bonnardel had mentioned this strategy. “There’s a gesture, I’m thinking out loud, if these people have mental health issues, was the follow-up done right by the doctors?” And then can these people get a driver’s license? “, he said.
“You have to look at it coldly. […] Is this something doable? Faced with an X diagnosis, is that something we can do to protect [the population]? said Mr. Bonnardel.
“I don’t want to go too far in my thinking, but when you have a vehicle in your hands, you know, whether you’re under the influence of alcohol, drugs or medication X that can cause trouble and lead to this case of madness as we saw [Monday], problem assuming that it is due to that. […] maybe we have to look at certain situations to see how, how we can prevent that,” he explained.
But this reflection will not take place, decided the minister a few hours later. “It is an exercise that we do not undertake. I was asked the question twice, and I repeated twice saying: I think out loud. […] But this is not an exercise that the government will begin. »
According to the police, the gesture would be premeditated and the victims were chosen at random. “They were pedestrians walking on the edge of the 132 on both sides of the road, for a certain distance,” said Sergeant Claude Doiron, spokesperson for the SQ.
Minister Bonnardel drew a parallel between Monday’s attack and “the ram bus in Laval that killed children.” “We will have to do an exercise afterwards to try to understand, and to try to reassure the population. I remain worried about two cases like that, [Monday] and Laval,” he said.
He also questioned whether the pandemic has “exacerbated” mental health cases. ” I think so. I don’t want to say it’s the fault of the pandemic, but it looks like it has exacerbated several cases,” he said.
The Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, for his part wanted to highlight the exemplary reaction of the health network to the tragedy. “I want to send the message that the health network has reacted very well. We [saw him] with the emergency plane, so I just want to say thank you to the network, ”he said when he arrived at the parliamentary committee. Work resumed Tuesday in Quebec after two weeks of parliamentary recess.
“I think everyone was hit. We were struck a few weeks ago, when the other event happened [in Laval]. My thoughts are with the families because it is exceedingly sad. We would never want to experience that, ”said Minister Dubé.
