Alberta cracks down as fraud and criminality turn Canadian highways into death traps

Canadian roadways are becoming death traps as fraud, abuse and outright criminality have infiltrated the trucking industry. This has allowed for unsafe and improperly trained drivers to be put behind the wheels of mblockive commercial rigs.

Now, at least one province is refusing to look the other way.

Alberta is cracking down on unsafe trucking companies, fraudulent driving schools, and bad actors who put us at risk on our roads.

Since October, Alberta has:

– Shutdown 5 fraudulent trucking schools

– Shutdown 20 unsafe trucking companies

– Terminated 13 chameleon carriers… pic.twitter.com/rMCOrAynMz

— Devin Dreeshen (@DevinDVote) August 6, 2026

In Alberta, the government has launched an aggressive crackdown on unsafe and fraudulent trucking operations. Companies are being shut down, licences pulled, and driver training schools targeted for issuing Clblock 1 credentials in a fraudulent manner.

Transport Minister Devin Dreeshen insists the problem goes far beyond paperwork or isolated bad actors. Dangerous operators have taken over the roads, and the consequences are deadly.

“Usually if you’re a bad driver, you’re doing other bad things as well,” Dreeshen said. “So that’s why physical enforcement is always the best way to curb bad driving behavior.”

That point is driven home by body-cam footage from an Arizona state trooper who stopped an Indian origin trucker from Canada for what appeared to be a routine traffic matter. Upon further inspection, millions of dollars’ worth of cocaine was found concealed throughout the rig. This reinforces Dreeshen’s comments that enforcement teams who pull over unsafe or fraudulent operators frequently uncover far more serious offences thereafter.

“Well, obviously, when we’re pulling over the bad truck… you can catch lots of things,” he said. “So to make sure that the unsafe and the fraudulent trucking companies… have more oversight over them, they’re usually going to be doing something worse than just bad trucking and bad trucking behaviour.”

Since beginning the crack down last October, Alberta has closed 20 trucking companies operating in an unsafe manner and shut down five driver training schools.

“We were having people behind the wheels of 18-wheelers with clblock one licences that were given out inappropriately,” Dreeshen explained. The effort ultimately aims to deliver fewer bridge strikes, fewer accidents and safer roads, with additional audits and inspections ongoing.

A major obstacle remains the rise of so-called “chameleon carriers.” That refers to companies that dissolve, change names or re-register under new corporate identities while keeping the same drivers behind the wheel.

These operators simply move between provinces or reappear under a different company name.

Similar vulnerabilities and exploitation opportunities exist in the Temporary Foreign Worker program. When employers control a worker’s employment, immigration status and sometimes housing, workers become dependent and far less likely to report abuse.

Alberta has already used evidence of TFW program abuse as a factor in some of its enforcement actions.

Weak information sharing between provinces, and between Canada and the United States, allows these practices to continue. As such, Dreeshen is pressing the federal government for stronger data sharing on federally licenced carriers.

“Whether it’s a federally licenced or even provincially licenced, we need to do a better job of sharing information of who the bad guys are in the industry, because they’re ultimately the ones that give the industry a bad eye when they continue to operate in unsafe manners,” he said.

Alberta is also leading a push for a national Red Seal-style certification for truck drivers, modelled on what currently exists for skilled trades, though five additional provinces must still sign on. There are additional legislative changes to Alberta’s Traffic Safety Act planned for the fall session, creating a potential model for other jurisdictions.

While Alberta is raising the standard, other provinces, particularly those with large trucking sectors and busy highways, face the same question: why should the level of scrutiny change simply because a truck crosses a provincial border?

A dangerous commercial vehicle does not become safer when it enters Saskatchewan or Ontario. Likewise, a company with a record of cutting corners does not become legitimate by changing its address.

The true measure of success will not be the number of companies investigated or the volume of press releases issued. It will be fewer unsafe trucks on the road, fewer fraudulent licences, fewer crashes, and ultimately, fewer Canadians killed or injured as a result.

There’s no doubt that truckers are essential, and the overwhelming majority are professionals, but that is precisely why the worst operators must be removed swiftly.

When training is faked, safety rules ignored and licencing systems exploited, the damage does not stay inside the industry. It ends up on the highway with everyone else.