The committee met at 8:36 a.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): Good morning, everyone. My name is Doug Routley. I’m the MLA for Nanaimo–North Cowichan and the Chair of the Special Committee on Reforming the Police Act, an all-party committee of the Legislative Assembly.

I would like to acknowledge that the committee is meeting today on the legislative precinct in Victoria, which is located on the homeland of the Lək̓ʷəŋin̓əŋ-speaking peoples, now known as Songhees and Esquimalt Nations.

I would like to welcome all those who are listening to and participating in this meeting.

Our committee is undertaking a broad review with respect to policing and related systemic issues in B.C. We are taking a phased approach to this work and are meeting with a number of organizations and individuals over the fall to follow up on input we’ve already received and to learn more about new models and approaches that have been drawn to our attention.

For today’s meeting, we’ll be hearing from Prof. Angela Workman-Stark, associate professor and associate dean from the Athabasca University, who is joining us via Zoom.

As a reminder to our presenter, all audio from our meetings is broadcast live on our website. A complete transcript will also be posted.

I’ll now ask members of the committee to introduce themselves. I’ll ask, first, my friend MLA Davies, the Deputy Chair of the committee.

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): Good morning. Dan Davies. I’m the MLA for Peace River North. Thank you for joining us.

K. Kirkpatrick: Hi, I’m Karin Kirkpatrick. I am the MLA for West Vancouver–Capilano.

A. Olsen: Adam Olsen, MLA for Saanich North and the Islands.

G. Lore: Good morning. Grace Lore. I’m the MLA for Victoria–Beacon Hill.

R. Singh: Good morning. Rachna Singh, MLA for Surrey–Green Timbers.

R. Glumac: Good morning. I’m Rick Glumac, MLA for Port Moody–Coquitlam.

H. Sandhu: Good morning. I’m Harwinder Sandhu, MLA for Vernon-Monashee. Thanks for joining us.

G. Begg: Hello, I’m Garry Begg, the MLA for Surrey-Guildford.

D. Routley (Chair): Assisting the committee today are Karan Riarh, beside me, and Katey Stickle, further beside me, from the Parliamentary Committees Office, and Amanda Heffelfinger from Hansard Services. I thank them for their help.

I’d like to welcome Angela Workman-Stark.

Thank you, Angela, for joining us today. Go ahead.

Presentations on Police Act

ANGELA WORKMAN-STARK

A. Workman-Stark: Thanks very much for the invitation. It’s a pleasure to meet everyone.

I just want to let you know that I’m connecting with you from the traditional territories of the Treaty 7 Nations here in southern Alberta.

In addition to my role as associate professor at the Athabasca University, I just wanted to add that I’m also a retired chief superintendent from the RCMP. One of my last formal roles was overseeing the organization respond to very serious issues of gender discrimination and harassment.

[8:40 a.m.]

Naturally, this work informs what I do in my current role, which is exploring aspects of police culture that contribute to different types of misconduct and investigating what we might be able to do about it. I also work with police leaders in Canada and internationally to assist them with creating more inclusive police services.

Naturally, the recommendations or the suggestions that I’ll make towards the end of this presentation this morning will be largely based on this idea that a more inclusive style of policing is established from the inside out.

I’ve been asked to speak about my work into police culture. Before I get into that, what I’d like to point out is that even my own research — research that’s conducted in other, similar jurisdictions of western society — indicates that a majority of police officers come into policing out of a desire to make a difference. They want to serve their communities, but what we underestimate is the power of the police socialization process. Those are the cultural aspects that I’ll get into, which means that changes to recruitment alone are not going to be enough to overcome some of these challenges. I’ll get into these a little bit later.

Just to provide an overview of some of the sort of general descriptions of police culture…. Again, this is consistent from Canada, the U.S., the U.K., Australia — similar jurisdictions. It’s a culture, and just to add to this, it’s probably one of the most studied occupational cultures, certainly to my knowledge. It’s been frequently described as cynical, distrustful, suspicious, socially isolated, inward-focused and resistant to change, but one of the more common and perhaps more negative depictions is of it as this occupational culture that is very masculine, hypermasculine.

Some researchers, some of my colleagues, might refer to it as this idea as a cult of masculinity, in which police officers are typically required to prove their desired forms of masculinity to fit in and be accepted. What I mean by this is an appropriate level of physical toughness, aggression, showing no weakness at all, which means controlling their emotions, and avoiding engaging in some types of work which might be perceived as feminine.

Why do we care about this? Well, what we know from, again, my own work and other studies is that in efforts to actually respond to this sense of an identity threat, some officers have engaged in excessive risk-taking. They’ve also resorted to bullying, harassing and excluding individuals who don’t fit in. Typically, this has been women, but it has also involved marginalized men.

They may hide issues with their physical and mental health, or they may downplay an important part of their identity such as their gender, their race, their sexuality. We see, again, from our research that these types of responses have also involved aggressive action taken against marginalized members of society.

I just want to give you a little bit of a sense of what I mean by these masculinity norms — we might call them masculinity contest norms — that can function in police organizations. I’ll read to you, briefly, three quotes that come out of my research, just to demonstrate how these norms manifest and how they might affect individuals. This is research, just for clarity, conducted over the last few years, of officers across Canada.

The first. “The big strong wolves were out there in uniform dealing with certain people in a certain way, and I was like: ‘Wow. Is this what I have to do to conform, to be part of the culture?’ Some of my classmates didn’t adapt, and I saw what happened to them. They were ostracized.”

“I didn’t want to admit to my sergeant that I was struggling, because right away they’d think: ‘Oh, there’s the woman, having to take time off.’ You would hear them talk about other people like that. You didn’t want to be that person. When I look back, I never said anything about it. I just thought: ‘Okay, I’m just going to get out of the way and move on and do my job.’ If you stayed under the radar and didn’t become a target of anything and just did your work, they only knew you for your work.”

Finally: “I suffer from PTSD and mild depression. The only member who knows this is my current supervisor. I dare not tell anyone else for fear of persecution one way or another.”

Until recently, we haven’t really been able to diagnose some of these more harmful aspects of police culture. We’ve only been able to sort of study them through interviews of police officers, as you might imagine. Additionally, we haven’t been able to test what might be some of their relationships with other outcomes, as I’ve described earlier, or some of the factors within the workplace that might influence some of these cultural elements.

Over the last few years, I’ve had the opportunity to work with experts from Canada and the U.S. to develop a survey instrument. What I mean by this are questions that can be administered within police organizations and other, similar occupations, to test for items which suggest that that workplace, that culture, is very much like a masculinity contest in which individuals are not expected to show any weakness.

[8:45 a.m.]

They’re expected to show an appropriate level of strength and physicality, perhaps even to put their work first before external commitments, or even a bit of a competitive environment that pits their officers against each other, and ends up in an environment where the winners dominate others, which, typically, we have seen to be white, heterosexual men. So this instrument was tested extensively and has obviously been published in peer-reviewed journals.

In my own work, I conducted two studies on two large Canadian police services. I’d just like to provide you with an overview of these findings and then get into why this is relevant and where I think there are opportunities in the work that you’re doing.

As I’ve indicated, a few years ago two large police services…. I administered the survey instrument. Again, I was looking for evidence of these cultural norms and indications of what types of harm this might create for individuals. What I found was that officers working in the front-line ranks — that is, officers who had to be in uniform and had the most interactions with members of society — were more likely to describe their working envi­ronment as a masculinity contest. Again, thinking of these aspects of showing no weakness, don’t show any emotion, don’t show vulnerability, making a mistake, etc.

They reported higher levels of workplace harassment, lower levels of psychological well-being. They expressed greater thoughts and intentions to leave their organization. They reported higher levels of job dissatisfaction and feeling less attached to the police service in which they felt a sense of belonging and being valued and supported by their organization.

What was probably more concerning was this idea that they reported having much lower levels of psychological safety, and what this means is feeling safe enough to speak up, share concerns, share ideas without some form of repercussion from their colleagues or their supervisors and managers.

We think about different types of misconduct and whether that’s misconduct that’s internal to the organization and the actions against other officers. It also refers to types of misconduct that might be occurring out on the street. So this low level of psychological safety would be preventing some individuals from reporting some of the things that they might see.

While these findings might appear quite shocking and unnerving for many individuals, within that research, though, there is some optimism for change. I just want to indicate that I expected to find that these…. Again, given what we know from research, given many of the reports that have come out about some of the harmful actions within police organizations in Canada, I did not find that these norms were as pervasive as I expected, which suggests that the police culture is changing, and I think that’s something to be built upon.

For example, where officers perceive that they were treated fairly in the sense that their supervisors and managers engaged them in decision-making that affected them, that practised unbiased, consistent, accurate deci­sion-making and treated them with dignity and respect, they were much less likely to indicate that their workplace was this type of very toxic environment, and they certainly reported fewer negative outcomes.

What this tells us is that the fair treatment by leaders and supervisors really has the potential to reduce these internal norms, which also, as I indicated previously, can trickle out on to the street, in terms of their harmful interactions with members of the community.

My research was not the only indication of this. I just want to share…. I’m happy to share any of this with the committee as well — these studies.

There’s research that has been undertaken in both the U.S. and the U.K. that also suggests that when police leaders, again at the supervisor and managerial level…. When they adhere to the principles of justice…. Again, just to clarify, that’s really about making decisions in an equitable, open and transparent manner, behaving in an unbiased fashion and, again, treating officers respectfully and with dignity.

The research, the studies, have shown that officers are much more likely to be open to change, and this is really important, considering the depiction of policing, the culture, as being very resistant to change. These studies show that the officers are open.

The studies have also shown that this fair treatment has improved the attitudes of police officers and their interactions with members of the public, so there’s something to be said here about the way that officers are treated on the inside, by their own supervisors and leaders, and about the way they will interact with individuals on the outside.

[8:50 a.m.]

Part of my work, also, was not about just diagnosing the culture and learning more about it and what might be some of the more pervasive elements of it. I also was really interested in learning about what might be some of those possible contributing factors. This, again, involved interviews, extensively, with senior leaders, individuals, about these two organizations and reviewing documents. And what I found is probably three related root causes, if you will. There seems to be….

Again, not all cases. I cannot generalize these findings to all organizations. We do see some differences. But there seemed to be a consistent emphasis on this physical crime-fighting role as being what real policing is and, again, disparaging community policing–type roles or crime prevention roles as not real police work.

This was seen in the leaders that were selected for some of the roles in these two organizations, as well as the opportunities that were provided for individuals that conveyed the value that was placed on this type of work. It was also, certainly, communicated in the language that was used by individuals as I spoke to them about what they felt was considered real policing.

There was also, I found, the big reliance on some of these traditional performance indicators — metrics such as crime stats, crime clearance rates and traffic tickets. And the third factor identified was insufficient investments in leadership development, selection and the prevalence, in some cases, of really outdated leadership models.

I just wanted to share with you briefly that, over and above these studies and these two organizations, over the last 18 months to two years, I had an opportunity to conduct interviews with police officers all across Canada at all ranks — individuals that were junior in service to individuals who are much more senior in service. The reason I highlight this is because of — I’ll touch on it briefly — this sense of being a hero at the beginning of the COVID to really becoming this idea of a zero, as in their language, as they put it, post–George Floyd and the death of George Floyd.

I highlight these things because they reinforce what I found in these two large organizations. Officers consistently highlighted the issues with fairness and inclusion. So in cases where they were treated fairly and felt valued and included by their supervisors and managers, they reported much more positive experiences, much more positive attitudes about their work in communities.

Obviously, the opposite is true. They identified this pressure to conform at various stages in their careers — pressures to conform and be a bit more aggressive, showing that they were authoritarian enough, showing a “who’s the boss?” type of caricature. They consistently report being afraid to make mistakes, especially in the current climate, for fear of being persecuted, either by the media, individuals in government or by their own organizations — afraid to speak up.

Many identified less with an aggressive style of policing, so I think this is very positive. This is the cultural change that I spoke about. We see less of them identifying with this aggressive style of policing and see them much more as guardians of the community.

They also see officers engaged in misconduct as morally tainted. I think that’s an important thing to think about and how we can leverage these individuals.

A key thing here, though, that I think is quite important is that many of the officers I spoke with still highlight that they love what they do. They’re proud of what they do. They’re proud of the work they do in their communities. Yet less than 50 percent of them would recommend it as a career. This is particularly important when we think of recruitment. Many of the officers that come into policing do so from a family connection or from a friend, someone that they know.

Another fact I just want to point out briefly is that these officers are less likely to reveal to outsiders, when they’re off duty, what they do, because they fear some sort of negative conversation surfacing, depending on how the people perceive of the police.

Finally, just on this — I’m going to touch briefly on the recommendations — they do see the need for change in policing, such as improvements in leadership, building better relationships in communities and then redefining some of those roles, such as how the police respond to calls for mental health.

Just briefly, then, to go through my recommendations here that I’ll put forth…. I don’t know how much authority within the confines of your work that you have to pursue these, but they’re really about influencing cultural change.

One is the development of consistent and more relevant performance indicators that move beyond some of these traditional crime stats. I know this has been recommended by one of your former presenters.

I also want to highlight focusing on training that helps officers make sense of how the police culture and their continued interactions with marginalized members of society can lead to a police world view, or what we might call bias against certain groups, and how they can counter it. So this would be in your standards for training. Again, this is a different type of training.

[8:55 a.m.]

I also strongly urge the adoption of a consistent police leadership model that promotes justice, inclusion and safety. As I look at the act now, the focus is on standards for individual officers, but I think it’s really critical that the standards also involve, now, standards for leadership.

Finally, it’s an overarching recommendation, where we’re very much about looking at implementing mechanisms to oversee and evaluate the implementation of any recommendations that are put forth. This is actually to see not only that they’re progressing but that they achieve their intended outcomes.

I’m happy to answer any questions that you have about these comments. I know they’re brief, but I’ve reached my time limit.

D. Routley (Chair): Thank you very much for your presentation. It’s much appreciated.

I will open the floor to questions from members.

G. Begg: Thank you, Angela. I wonder if you could comment on…. When we talk globally of a police culture, is the culture inherited? Is it created? In other words, does the culture attract people who are interested in that culture, or do they become acculturated by a culture that already exists?

A. Workman-Stark: I think it’s a bit of both. We see individuals that obviously have that influence of people that they know, so they have a bit of exposure of their experience. It may attract them for some of those reasons. But what I see more in my research and certainly other research is that individuals, again, come in out of a…. Some of them call it — they refer to it as — a calling. They really do have a desire to make a difference and serve their community.

That socialization process that you spoke about is what we see as very powerful. That begins at training, and it continues through to the first posting. It’s why, in my conversations with police leaders, I talk about the importance of really determining where those individuals are posted because that can really influence how they develop as a police officer and take on a certain type of identity and whether that’s a more aggressive style of police officer or someone who really wants to become immersed in the community.

G. Begg: Without being overly general, is it a phenomenon of Canadian policing? Is it particular or peculiar to one police organization? Is it widespread?

A. Workman-Stark: When we talk about the police occupational culture, we’re talking about the police culture more broadly, right? So we see it across western society. For instance, the studies that we conduct in Canada would be consistent with what we see in Australia, New Zealand, the U.K., the U.S. to a certain extent, although we know there are different issues in the U.S. But this is something….

Also, just to build onto your question, in research we find that typically officers identify more with the broader policing community and this identity of a police officer than they do with their own police services. That can change, depending on the level of leadership inside. For instance, I work with some police services in Canada where there’s a very strong attachment to that police service because of the values, because of the leaders, because of how individuals are treated.

I hope that answers your question.

G. Begg: It does. Can I carry on for two more quick questions?

D. Routley (Chair): Yes. We’ve only got one more so far.

G. Begg: You know that in British Columbia, the RCMP is the provincial police organization. We know that there are differences in detachments. In other words, some detachments do very well. Some don’t. I guess that follows up to what you said earlier: it is the leadership at various detachments that will make the difference? It becomes more consistent through leadership.

A. Workman-Stark: Yes. As I mentioned, what we’re finding in the research is that in the presence of good leadership — as I spoke about, leaders who focus on inclusion and fairness — we see less indication of these very negative norms, which does illustrate that leadership can make the difference in detachments or police units or even organizations.

G. Begg: Quickly, you mentioned performance indicators as not being an accurate measurement. I wonder, then, how you measure, how we measure, the performance of policing if there aren’t metrics attached to the work.

A. Workman-Stark: I think it’s shifting how we think about performance. I know one of your previous presenters spoke about this idea of consistently assessing levels of trust and confidence in the police by the public. Even asking questions about procedural and distributive justice…. Do individuals from all communities think that they are treated fairly, respectfully, that there’s quality decision-making in terms of those interactions with the police and that they have equitable outcomes as other individuals?

[9:00 a.m.]

Again, this is probably going to be a little bit, not so much provocative but…. It’s probably going to be an unusual suggestion. Because we see the strong correlation with how individuals are treated on the inside with, potentially, how they interact with members of the community, I think it’s really important to start looking at these types of metrics as well to assess, again, the sense of justice and safety within police organizations. It can indicate almost an early warning system where there may be issues to pursue.

I think this is something relevant to look at — the internal, external dimensions performance.

G. Lore: Thank you, Dr. Workman-Stark. There is a lot of really important material here, and I’m really glad to have you sharing your expertise with us.

I’ll say very briefly that some of the elements you’ve raised around hypermasculinity and what it means for psychological safety…. I have a great deal of concern for what that means for addressing, particularly, some types of crime in community, including gender-based violence.

The piece I wanted to ask you about is whether your research or other research touches on the question of who stays in policing and who leaves early and whether…. I think, in addition to some of the questions my colleague was asking around who opts in and where that culture comes from, a question of opting out…. Whether those who might challenge that leave earlier and whether that has amplifying effects on the culture.

A. Workman-Stark: For Canadian policing, we don’t have very high attrition rates. They’re typically about 4 to 5 percent per year, so we don’t have a really high turnover, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t some sort of effect. That’s why we assess the contingents of leave.

When individuals are thinking about leaving — “I’m not happy here; I don’t feel valued here; I want to find some other place to work” — they’re not really engaged and dedicated towards the work, so we find that they sort of check out. Some of the work I’ve been doing over the last year is really about this process of identity and how individuals take on this identity of a police officer or how they shed parts of it.

This is to your point. Individuals have, again, reflected on feeling the pressure to conform — adopting for a bit. So adopting, becoming, maybe, a bit more aggressive, and showing they’re a bit more authoritative in their interactions. But then they kind of hit a period where they actually can find their own way and revert back to those initial values that they had and those reasons that they had to come in.

Either that’s come about because of strong co-workers, or they’ve been assigned to work with a really fair and inclusive and strong leader on their team. So I think we’ve seen some of this, yes, but we don’t see a lot of exits, and we don’t see…. I think to opt in or opt out becomes a very personal decision of whether or not someone decides to conform, or they hold true to their values and they become isolated, in some cases.

I just want to add, though, that we do see evidence that this is changing. But this has been some of the historical cultural norms that we’ve seen in policing.

D. Routley (Chair): Go ahead, Karin.

K. Kirkpatrick: I’m fine, actually. I’ve got a little bit of my answer from both of those questions.

R. Glumac: I had some of my questions answered as well.

We keep hearing over and over, in different contexts, the importance of training. This is really the basis which everything is built on top of. You also just mentioned right now that…. We’ve heard in the past that there are some programs where police officers are, for example, with mental health professionals, and they cycle through that and learn certain things, and then they take that in and sort of share that with their colleagues.

It seems like that’s another form of ongoing training in a way, but it’s actually an on-the-ground kind of training. Do you think that there could be some principles articulated in the Police Act that would help shift the training paradigm to address some of the challenges that you’re bringing up?

[9:05 a.m.]

A. Workman-Stark: I’m happy to share some thoughts with the committee on that, for the sake of time. But I absolutely do. I think it’s expanding what we think about as the standards for training and the expectations for a police officer.

If you look at the Police Act, they’re kind of traditional. I think there is opportunity, to what you’re speaking about, to really expand that so we build a healthy foundation for an officer, not only on a one-time but also the idea of…. When we think about regulated professions, also the idea of ongoing professional development on an annual basis that’s not just about somebody’s tactical forms of training but also about, again, whether it’s around ethics or to think about cultural sensitivity or mental health or some things that…. I think there’s an opportunity to build a really strong foundation that continues to grow throughout the trajectory of an officer’s career.

I’m happy to share some thoughts.

R. Glumac: That’d be great.

A. Olsen: I’m just wondering if there are any examples of jurisdictions that have addressed the cultural issues that have been raised here that perhaps you can point to. We’ve heard aspects of this throughout our deliberations. It’s instructive for us to be able to go and do further research on areas that are doing a good job with this.

A. Workman-Stark: Absolutely. I’d highly recommend the New Zealand police. I suspect they’ve been recommended before. They really adhere to this idea of policing by consent. They’ve also just completed a reform process that I would consider to be one of the best examples of a monitoring process where it wasn’t just about…. It was a ten-year monitoring process. When you think about that, that’s quite extensive. We don’t typically have that kind of a life cycle in Canada. But it was a phenomenal monitoring process.

They had similar issues that they were required to address, but they had a monitoring oversight body that actually brought in experts to come in and evaluate on a regular basis to ensure that these recommendations were achieving their intended outcomes. I think they are an exemplar around leadership, around some of the changes to internal culture. I’ve had an opportunity to spend some time with them. Also in terms of the recruitment model, which completely moves away from this idea of this sort of masculinity, this hyper-aggressive individual.

If needed, I’m happy to share some of the primary context there with the committee.

R. Singh: Thank you, Dr. Stark. Really good information. A lot of my questions have been answered.

You touched upon George Floyd and the shift that brought and also the focus it brought on the systemic racism. We have heard from a number of stakeholders talking about that from the B.C. perspective.

You’ve talked about the New Zealand model. Since last year, since 2020, have you seen any changes that have come in other jurisdictions in Canada in the wake of George Floyd?

A. Workman-Stark: I don’t know. I know there are changes being spoken about. There has certainly been….

What I will say about George Floyd and his death is it has ignited a very important conversation, as we all know, and the conversation that you’re having now. I do know from my conversations with police organizations and police leaders, this conversation…. There are conversations about: how do they improve their relationships with communities? How do they actually engage and work actively with mental health providers?

I’ve had individual officers share with me that they’ve made a deliberate effort to meet with community groups and Indigenous leaders to learn more about their cultures and how they can be more responsive. So I think that activity is there.

One thing I’ll just add on top of your question is that I am really optimistic and inspired by some of the comments that I’ve heard from individual police officers. I think that if there’s an opportunity to engage with them, you will find that there are some very powerful ideas from them for change, which speaks to these many themes about…. Again, I had individuals in these interviews last year that highlighted how tough it was working in this environment and how they felt such a threat to who they were and who they’ve been for years and that that was no longer valued. But they also recognized the issue of systemic racism and the need to make some change.

Typically, for committees like this, we talk to representatives of different organizations and police leaders and people like me. I feel there’s an opportunity…. You’ll find some individual officers have some really terrific ideas on…. I mean, they are the individuals closest to the ground, doing the work, that see some real possibilities here.

R. Singh: Wonderful. Thank you.

[9:10 a.m.]

H. Sandhu: Thank you, Dr. Workman-Stark. You just mentioned that in New Zealand, they’ve reformed quite a few things.

You mentioned about recruitment. I wonder if you’ll be able to share…. We often talk about cultural sensitivity training and all and being mandated. Everybody takes it. Then is there a desire to change or to adapt it in their day-to-day life?

We’ve touched upon, and we’ve been thinking about, the recruitment standards — the prescreening or when they hire individuals. So now that you mention it, we would be curious to see if we get some more information about what changes they have made. That might be another piece to this puzzle that we’re trying to solve.

A. Workman-Stark: Sure. I’m happy to send some of that, and I’m happy to send their latest recruitment video, which is a very good indication of their values in terms of their communities and their people. Happy to share that with the committee.

H. Sandhu: Thank you. I appreciate it.

D. Routley (Chair): Thank you, everybody. Is there anyone else?

I think that’s it for our questions. We very much appreciate your contribution. Thank you for making yourself available to the committee today. We’ve got important work, and it has been very helpful to us.

Deliberations

D. Routley (Chair): Okay, Members. That ends the public portion of the meeting. We’ll be moving in camera for deliberation.

I’d ask for a motion to move the committee to in camera.

From Harwinder, seconded by Karin.

The committee continued in camera from 9:11 a.m. to 9:46 a.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): I’d like to thank members for a productive meeting.

I’ll ask for a motion to adjourn the meeting.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 9:47 a.m.