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In each case his licence was suspended and his car impounded. All told he’s out some $1,800 and without transportation, which he relies upon not just for himself but for his disabled sister. Even appealing — which he did once successfully and once not — costs $200.

Another British Columbian, 76-year-old Norma McLeod, who also suffers from COPD, was reportedly pulled over and breathalyzed for having just left a liquor store. She couldn’t make the machine go ding, and had her licence and car seized. Her appeal failed despite her doctor testifying to her condition. She’s launching a constitutional challenge against the law, and well she might.

In a statement to CBC, the RCMP claimed their officers’ hands are tied: Where they suspect impairment, the Criminal Code provides for alternative testing methods; but the new section covering “mandatory alcohol screening” does not. This may well be evidence of shoddy lawmaking. But the section emphatically does not compel officers to charge people in situations like Forster’s and McLeod’s.

The Liberals were warned that these two provisions in particular were engraved invitations to abuse

Then there’s Lee Lowrie, who says she was breathalyzed poolside at her sister’s house, where she had been enjoying a few beers, some two hours after turning off her car. She failed, and as a result lost her licence for 90 days and automobile for 30. “The RCMP were not willing to let me prove the amount of alcohol I had consumed (at) home. I even invited them in to see the empties,” she told Global News.