Thursday July 14, 2005
Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday July 14, 2005
‘Redneck’ Harris irked OPP inspector
Former Ontario premier Mike Harris was a “redneck” who wanted speedy action to remove native protesters from Ipperwash Provincial Park, but was resigned to proceeding through the courts, a judicial inquiry was told yesterday.
OPP Insp. Ron Fox testified yesterday he was paged to a noon-hour meeting at Queen’s Park on Sept. 6, 1995, the same day Dudley George was killed during a skirmish between police and protesters who’d moved into the park two days earlier.
At the meeting was the-then Conservative premier, his attorney general, solicitor general, natural resources minister and their deputy ministers.
In a subsequent call to the police commander at the Ipperwash standoff, John Carson, Fox warned police were dealing “with a real redneck government.”
“They are f . . . barrel suckers. They just are in love with guns. There’s no question they don’t give a sh . . less about Indians,” he said in the recorded call played yesterday at the Ipperwash inquiry.
During the meeting, Harris criticized police for not taking immediate action when the natives moved into the park and suggested it would be raised at a later inquiry, Fox said. (Hamilton Spectator)
