Trudeau defends $5.8 MILLION in social distancing fines to ordinary Canadians

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau addressed media on Monday morning, providing updates on the coronavirus pandemic, and particularly, on Canada's role on the global response to fight the virus.

Earlier this morning, Trudeau appeared on a European Union-led show to discuss globalist issues, stating that Canada needed to "take care of [itself] by taking care of the rest of the world."

Trudeau echoed those sentiments in this morning's address outside of Rideau Cottage, saying that Canada would be donating $850 million to the global fight against the vaccine, with some funding going towards vaccine development.

Trudeau said that the pledging conference this morning was "the beginning," saying that Canada was helping create solutions for the entire world.

Earlier today, Air Canada reported that they had seen losses of over $1 billion. Regarding Canada's airline sector, Trudeau said that more would be said sectoral support in the future, but referred to the CERB as something to support individual Canadians.

Trudeau looking forward to challenges facing economy

Conservative Party Leader Andrew Scheer, a vocal critic of Justin Trudeau's CERB plan, criticized Trudeau's CERB and Student Benefit due to its inherent damaging of incentive for Canadians to get back to work. Scheer says the CERB helped cushion the damage of the pandemic, but may damage Canada's start up, with the CERB benefit continuing to October.

In response to that, Trudeau said he was "really look[ing] forward to facing the challenge" of "how we start to scale back the benefits, and help people get back to work."

"We're not there yet, we're very much still trying to make sure that people are getting the support they need, even as the economy is starting to gradually reopen. Our focus is on keeping people safe and ensuring that they have the ability to stay home and pay for groceries..." Trudeau said.

Trudeau said that there would need to be "a lot of thought" to get people "out of their homes and back to work," but that for the time being, the focus was on "helping people through this."

PM defends $5.8 million in fines for breaking social distancing

Throughout the pandemic, Trudeau has been high on social distancing measures as recommended from global health authorities. Today, when asked by Global News, Trudeau defended a astonishing report that revealed that there has been $5.8 million in tickets and fines to Canadians for breaking those measures.

"It's extremely important that Canadians continue to behave as we have, largely, in social distancing and staying home in keeping ourselves... safe from rapid spread of COVID-19," said Trudeau.

Trudeau said the federal support given throughout Canada has been "so that people can stay home ... and we're seeing over the past weeks, the curve is flattening, and we are on a positive trajectory... it requires us to continue to remain attentive and vigilant in following the instructions set out by our public health officials. And that's why different jurisdictions have different... It's also why they have taken it upon themselves that those rules be followed for the protection for all Canadians," said Trudeau.