Sergeant Clarke White with the Medicine Hat Police Service’s Traffic Unit says they’ve received many calls in the past week about the concerns. On Wednesday, he penned a post on the Police Service’s Facebook page in an attempt to clarify the law.

“We felt it was necessary because of the amount of information, and the amount of feedback we were getting from the public about clarification on that, because the information that was spreading, it seemd unreasonable that police would be doing that sort of thing.

White says the aim of the two hour driving provision in the new law is to close a pair of loopholes for prosecution, the Bolus drinking defence and Post-drinking defence.

The Bolus drinking defence is when the accused claims to have consumed a significant amount of alcohol just prior to operating a vehicle, and defends their blood alcohol level did not have the opportunity to spike over .08 at the time they were driving.

The post-drinking defence was used when a driver operating a vehicle while impaired was involved in a collision, fled the scene, and went home or to a bar to drink alcohol excessively in an attempt to obstruct the investigation. By the time the accused was located, they could claim they were sober at the time of the collision, but became impaired between the collision and meeting police.

The new impaired driving laws give police the ability to demand a breath sample from all drivers without reasonable suspicion the driver is impaired during a traffic stop or checkstop.

White says there are very few situations where police would demand a breath sample from a person at their home.

“Police procedures for an impaired driving investigation have not changed,” he said. “They still require a reasonable suspicion in those cases where a person is no longer in the vehicle. For instances, cases where there is a driving complaint or a collision, and the offender has reached their home, or reached a bar and consumed alcohol. That’s where things have changed a bit in terms of prosecution of these offenders, and the new laws have allowed to close the loopholes in the prosecution with these offences.”

White’s full statement can be read here.