Sackville Mayor John Higham has sent a letter to Mount Allison students advising them to call the provincial COVID line or the RCMP to report suspected infractions of public health rules.
The messaging is a change in the communications coming from the town so far, which has previously focussed on encouraging compliance with public health rules and sharing information.
The Mayor’s letter says:
“If you have concerns about someone who is not following self-isolation requirements, who is organizing events with large groups of people or parties, who is not physical distancing, or who is generally just not following the requirements of the Chief Medical Officer of Health, please reach out and let the province know, for their safety and the safety of others in our community.”
The letter then goes on to provide contact information for the New Brunswick COVID-19 information line and the RCMP.
The province’s COVID-19 line has oft been referred to as a snitch line, because in addition to providing information about COVID 19 public health rules, the line serves as a place for people to report those they suspect are not following the rules.
During its first month of activity in New Brunswick, the so-called snitch line answered more than 8,000 “non-health-related” calls, resulting in a total of 29 tickets being issued for violating the province’s state of emergency order.
In the same month, the Moncton RCMP reported they were also being inundated with calls to report people flouting the public health rules.
Clarification of rules needed first, says MASU president
President of the Mount Allison Students’ Union Jon Ferguson says the union does not support “using any sort of snitch line as a matter of first resort.”
“We really, really encourage students and residents of the community, or whoever’s involved, to speak with one another and try and communicate how they feel about what’s going on before calling a snitch line.”
Ferguson says a big issue for the union is the clarity of public health rules as they apply to student life. The New Brunswick Student Alliance is leading the effort to have rules relevant to both on and off campus students defined and communicated more clearly.
“What can a university student on campus or off campus exactly do? Because a lot of these guidelines—and you know, I’ve read through them myself in great detail again and again—it isn’t really clear to what degree students can gather in groups and where and how many, how often and to what degree. And you know, changes when you go inside as opposed to outside, which is important as we enter the fall months and things start to get colder. So we are asking PETL [Post-Secondary Education, Training and Labour] and Public Health to be clear with what students can do first of all, before we start talking about fines and snitch lines for you know, doing what exactly?”
Ferguson spoke to CHMA from a New Brunswick Student Alliance Conference, where he hopes the matter will be discussed today.
