The committee met at 6:40 p.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): Okay, everybody. With the committee’s indulgence, I will call the meeting to order.

I’d like to acknowledge the committee is meeting on the traditional territories of the Lək̓ʷəŋin̓əŋ-speaking peoples, known as the Songhees and the Esquimalt Nations.

The first item of business for our meeting is a follow-up presentation from the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General regarding recent amendments to the Special Provincial Constable Complaints and Discipline Regulation.

I’ll introduce our guests. I’ll also say that some members have said they might like to ask more broad-ranging questions in the mix at the end of the meeting.

I hope that might be all right and within whatever you might be prepared for, Mr. Rideout.

W. Rideout: We’re ready for it all.

D. Routley (Chair): All right. That’s great to hear. I can’t echo it, but that’s great to hear.

Our guests are, again — thank you — Mr. Wayne Rideout, who’s the assistant deputy minister and director of police services in the ministry; Ardys Baker, executive director, legislative initiatives and policy accountability; Corinne Alexander, program manager, municipal policing, governance and oversight division; and Cole Winegarden, director, legislation and policing programs.

I’m very thankful that you found the time to be able to come back. We have specific questions around the item at hand. To get to those, I’d ask you to take it away.

It’s all yours, Mr. Rideout.

Follow-up
Presentation on Police Act

MINISTRY OF PUBLIC SAFETY
AND SOLICITOR GENERAL

W. Rideout: Thank you for having us. Thank you to my team for both preparing me and doing some of the work that you’ve seen. I believe you have a letter that we sent to you late last week that outlines much of what we’ll be talking about here today.

It’s my pleasure to have been invited to the special committee to provide information on recent amendments to the Special Provincial Constable Complaints and Discipline Regulation.

Special provincial constables — or SPCs, as they are referred to — are appointed at the discretion of the minister under section 9 of the Police Act to perform a variety of peace officer functions. There are approximately 1,350 special provincial constable appointments, and about 400, or 29 percent, are employed within the B.C. public service. Of these, 84 percent, or approximately 330, are union members.

The range of agencies that use special provincial constables are the Legislative Assembly Protective Services; WorkSafeBC; the Justice Institute of B.C., firearms instructors; forensic psychiatric hospitals, security officers; the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; RCMP, support personnel; Metro Vancouver Transit Pol­ice, support personnel.

A limited number of external law enforcement agencies that do work in B.C. on a short-term basis receive temporary special provincial constable status through my office.

The following three Crown agencies, which include the B.C. Securities Commission, the Insurance Corp. of B.C. and the Financial Services Authority.

Thirteen compliance and enforcement units across eight ministries, including the conservation officer service in the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy; the audit and investigations branch, the Ministry of Health; the intersection safety camera unit in RoadSafetyBC; and the enforcement division within the gaming policy and enforcement branch of the Ministry of Public Safety and Solicitor General.

I’m going to call them SPCs, just because it rolls off my tongue a little easier.

SPC appointments are an adjunct appointment to an individual’s primary employment appointment. For exam­ple, public service employees are appointed under the Public Service Act prior to being appointed as SPCs. SPCs who hold unionized positions also have their employment relationship governed by the applicable collective agreement.

[6:45 p.m.]

An SPC appointment permits the appointee to exercise the powers and immunities of a provincial constable that are necessary to carry out their ordinary job functions. The SPC appointments are also subject to the restrictions specified in those appointments, the regulations and the common law.

Generally speaking, someone who holds an SPC appointment will only need the powers and immunities it provides when fulfilling specific tasks, and these tasks do not make up the majority of their employment-related duties.

For SPCs such as ministry investigators, the SPC ap­pointment may authorize them to obtain a search warrant other the Offence Act, lay charges under any provincial statute, obtain judicial authorization, serve a promise to appear, conduct surveillance with a warrant and be an agent for the Crown.

If policing and law enforcement services are viewed as law enforcement continuum, SPCs would fall in the mid­dle due to the limited nature of the appointment. This continuum is very nuanced, but the following is a high-level summary.

At the beginning of the law enforcement continuum, you will find police officers, including RCMP officers, municipal police officers and officers of designated policing units such as the Metro Transit Police. Police officers occupy the independent office of the constable and, in that regard, are unique from peace officers, who have limited law enforcement functions.

The common law has created four principal duties of police officers: the duty to preserve the peace and prevent crime; the duty to enforce the law; the duty to preserve life, protect against serious injury and protect property; and the duty to execute warrants. These common law duties have been codified provincially in the Police Act and federally in the RCMP Act.

After police officers, there are designated law enforcement units under the Police Act. These officers have peace officer status that can be authorized to enforce specific laws but do not necessarily do so. For example, the designated law enforcement unit that is part of the Organized Crime Agency of B.C. provides supplemental support to police.

There are three special provincial constables under the Police Act. As I have noted, this is an adjunct appointment to the individual’s primary employment appointment and is made to provide the peace officer powers and immunities that are necessary to enable the individual to effectively carry out their ordinary job functions.

An appointee is only able to exercise SPC authority when on duty and in the performance of their ordinary job functions. For example, a gaming investigator with an SPC appointment will not be authorized to investigate offences under the taxation statutes for offences under the Motor Vehicle Act, because that is not within their SPC authority.

Next on the continuum, there are statutory enforcement officers, primarily provincial employees, who enforce a variety of statutes. Their law enforcement authorities come from a specific statute or multiple statutes and are limited to the enforcement of the applicable statute — for example, community safety officers under the Cannabis Control and Licensing Act; commercial vehicle safety and enforcement officers under the Motor Vehicle Act, Commercial Transport Act and other statutes; B.C. Corrections staff and probation officers under the Corrections Act; sheriffs under the Sheriff Act; and municipal bylaw enforcement officers under the Community Charter.

These individuals are common law peace officers when exercising their statutory enforcement powers. They may hold SPC appointments to enable them to exercise the powers and immunities of a provincial constable that are necessary to carry out their ordinary job functions.

Next on the continuum are auxiliary police officers and special municipal constables. These officers and constables provide a support role to regular police officers, such as assisting with traffic control or large community events. Auxiliary officers are volunteers, while special municipal constables are paid. Some special constables are like SPCs in the appointment, in that this appointment is adjunct to the individual’s primary employment duties — for example, support personnel within municipal agencies.

Moving on, I’d like to go over the reasons for the Special Provincial Constable Complaints and Discipline Regulation change. In June ’22, the B.C. Court of Appeal decision Casavant v. British Columbia, through the Labour Relations Board, created uncertainty for the ministry regarding the scope of matters that are admissible under the regulation.

[6:50 p.m.]

The decision held that complaints and discipline in­volving the exercise of an SPC’s constabulary duties or powers must proceed under the regulation. The court maintained that in terms of disciplining an employee holding an SPC employment, there is a distinction between employment-related conduct and constabulary conduct. It is only the latter, the constabulary conduct, that is subject to the processes set out in the regulation.

As a result of that uncertainty, the ministry amended the regulation as minimally as possible while the committee’s work was ongoing to ensure that the regulation reflected the ministry’s policy intention. For instance, first, the regulation was amended to limit its application to complaints made by a member of the public or someone acting on behalf of that person if the member of the public is incapable of doing so due to their age or mental or physical condition.

The issue of whether the regulation applies to public complaints, as opposed to matters of internal discipline of SPCs, was not raised before the Court of Appeal. Ministry policy and practice had been, and continues to be, to limit the regulation to public complaints. However, the wording of the previous regulation was not clear on this point, so the regulation was amended to provide the needed clarity.

Second, the regulation was amended to clarify the type of conduct that is subject to the processes under the regulation. By explicitly stating that the regulation applies only to the conduct of an SPC that is constabulary in nature…. The common law recognizes that while the regulation applies to SPCs in relation to complaints about the manner in which they carry out their SPC duties, nothing in the regulation or the Police Act immunizes SPCs from other disciplinary processes for misconduct that is unrelated to SPC duties.

However, the regulation was not clear whether it applied to all conduct of a person holding an SPC appointment or only the conduct related to the performance of a constabulary duty. This lack of clarity in the regulation created an ambiguity about how employers should address concerns with employees who are SPCs when the conduct of concern is not constabulary in nature.

I understand that the special committee is seeking clarity on the material impact of those changes in terms of the union processes. While I will not comment on a labour relations matter, I can provide the following.

The Public Service Act does not apply to SPCs because section 6 of the Police Act specifically disapplies it. How­ever, the common law has recognized that the Public Service Act applies to regular employee matters for individuals who hold SPC appointments. This means that in the context of disciplinary proceedings for special provincial constables who are provincial government employees, the Public Service Act has limited application to matters of discipline. Additionally, labour unions, including the B.C. General Employees Union, do not have legal standing in the complaint process under the regulation.

The BCGEU wrote to the Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General on January 20, 2021, and presented before this committee on February 26, 2021, to request that the SPC regulation be amended to permit labour relations dispute resolution processes to apply to discipline under the regulation. Specifically, the BCGEU requested that section 8 of the regulation be amended to require that any challenge to a supervised decision to impose a corrective or disciplinary measure must be brought forward by a member’s union under the applicable collective agreement.

While this amendment was requested, it was not made, given that it would be a significant change to the regulation, and the ministry did not want to substantially alter the regulation while the special committee was conducting its review. It should be noted that a regulation does not prevent the BCGEU from supporting its members in an informal capacity during an investigation under the regulation.

Due to the ambiguity within the regulation and the un­certainty raised by the Casavant decision, narrow amendments were made, as I mentioned previously, to clarify that the regulation only applies in the case of public complaints and only to conduct involving the exercise of constabulary duty authorized under the SPC appointment. These narrow amendments reflect the ministry’s policy intent and are an interim measure, while the work of the special committee is underway, to reduce ambiguity and prevent a potential significant increase in the volume of complaints related to regular employee matters.

[6:55 p.m.]

Specifically, the amended regulation clarifies that only members of the public may make a complaint under the regulation. It clarifies that nothing in the regulation limits or prohibits an employer from disciplining an employee who holds an SPC appointment if the conduct at issue does not relate to the performance of its constabulary duties. It clarifies that constabulary duties are those specified in the relevant SPC appointment, not duties performed under legislation other than the Police Act or specified in any other agreements, such as a general employment agreement.

It empowers the director of police services to determine whether a complaint is admissible under the regulation, a function that was previously fulfilled by the special provincial constable’s supervisor. The rationale for this decision was that the director of police services is in the best position to determine if the conduct in question is constabulary or not.

While narrow amendments were made to the regulation, there is an opportunity to make broader policy changes. For example, the regulation only applies to public complaints. So there remains a lack of clarity about how a special provincial constable is to be disciplined for constabulary conduct that is not subject to a public complaint.

There may be additional opportunities for improving oversight that the special committee identifies. I look forward to the committee’s report and recommendations.

As a final point, I’d like to highlight that public complaints related to the conduct of special provincial constables in the province — constabulary duties — are rare. There have been 11 complaints in the past six years.

I thank you for the opportunity to speak to the committee and provide clarification on the Special Provincial Constable Complaints and Discipline Regulation. Myself and my team are happy to answer any questions you may have.

D. Routley (Chair): Thank you very much.

Members, questions?

A. Olsen: Thank you, Mr. Rideout, for the letter and for your presentation this evening. Thank you for extending your day for us, for the committee. We really appreciate it.

I’m understanding, on page 5, under “Specifically, the amended regulation:” and then I think the fourth point….

If I understood, part of the challenge that we faced was that there was a conflict between the constabulary duty and union discipline in terms of who can enforce that or who can discipline a member of a union and, as well, someone who has those constabulary duties.

Previously it was left to the union, the supervisor of…. Maybe not the union. It was left to the supervisor. Now that’s been moved to your role, to the director of police services. That sort of clarifies…. It takes it out of house, I guess.

W. Rideout: Yes, MLA. I think what it does is provide a degree of independence into the decision-making. The supervisor still has the authority to do any discipline with respect to their non-constabulary duties — anything with their general employment. When the matter becomes a product, if you will, of police-type work within that responsibility, that narrow slice of their daily duties, the new regulation makes that decision mine as far as whether it is within the domain of a constabulary duty or not.

I think that for many supervisors, it’s a very nebulous area to try to understand whether the specific facts of the duties surrounding the complaint were, in fact, a law enforcement or a police constabulary duty.

A. Olsen: If I may continue.

Mr. Rideout, can you provide, I guess, using maybe two examples…? We’ve got the legislative protective services here, which fall under this situation, as well as the conservation service. Can you maybe outline…? In the letter here, it says that they are, first, employees and members of the union. Then they’ve got these constabulary duties as kind of an auxiliary to their role.

[7:00 p.m.]

Can you explain how that plays out here, for an ex­ample, where we’ve got legislative protective services? Even on the ground out in rural B.C., where you’ve got special conservation officers, it seems like the primary role is to provide those constabulary services. Can you maybe just highlight the distinction here?

W. Rideout: Certainly. I think when it comes to the protective detail here, it’s difficult for me to fully understand what they do day in and day out, but it strikes me that they do a lot of security. They do a lot of security-type work for the grounds of the Legislative Assembly.

At times, the work that they do would cross over into the specifics of the special provincial constable authorities that they’ve been provided within their appointments. If they are, perhaps, not showing up for work on an ongoing basis or they’re not writing reports properly, pursuant to their employment, or any number of things that can happen in your general employment, that would fall under the conditions of their employment under their Public Service Act agreements.

However, if they engaged in the specific functions of their employment — in this case, making arrests or, perhaps, anything from a law enforcement function that fell outside of that — and that became a discipline process, it would be difficult for a supervisor to make a determination if it was squarely within a breach of the specific authorities they had. Under the new regulations, the facts of that would come to our office and we would make a determination if it should in fact be a discipline process under the Public Service Act or under the regulations.

Perhaps my colleagues might be able to give you some examples of what their specific authorities would be with respect to the protective details, even a few.

C. Alexander: The conservation officer service. Primarily their appointment is for exigent circumstances, so they have their regular conservation officer duties — Wildlife Act, Environment Management Act. That’s the primary function that they perform.

Then their SPCA appointment is for exigent circumstances primarily, which means those circumstances where a delay in taking enforcement action would result in danger to human life or safety or where the enforcement action is necessary to prevent the continuation of an offence which threatens human life or safety.

For instance, if a conservation officer was out on patrol doing their regular conservation officer duties, and, say, they came across a hunting party and there was an assault taking place, it would be appropriate for them to step in, and they have the authority to step in, as if they were police, because you have to appreciate that police could be an hour and half away.

A. Olsen: I appreciate the distinction and that clarity. I really appreciate these responses.

Just one. We have a situation where these are individuals that are carrying guns and have weapons and have training on those weapons. To a member of the public it would appear that they are performing the constabulary duty at all times because they are carrying weapons, and they’ve been given the ability to discharge those weapons. Not without oversight or without consequence, I should say, but they have the ability to do that.

Can you maybe just further add to the distinction? I think, to the public, it appears that while the letter of what their duties are might have a distinction, it doesn’t appear to be distinct.

W. Rideout: I think, though, MLA, they are trained before they get access to those use-of-force weapons and follow the standards that exist in the province for those. There are many circumstances in their daily duties where those firearms or those use-of-force options are available for them for their self-protection and, in this case, I would say the exigent circumstances in which, perhaps, a conservation officer — this a very good example — is in a remote area and comes across a hunting party and they’re drinking and things get out of control. It’s there for their protection.

While I concur with you that the outward appearance for some of these individuals is that they are police, they are not police in the broader sense of the term. They are only authorized to operate in that space in a very limited way.

[7:05 p.m.]

A. Olsen: But because of the way it’s defined, at any moment, they could act in their constabulary role, based on their own discretion at that moment, to determine whether or not…? Is that right?

W. Rideout: Well, the wording is not the same for all of them. I think what we’ve just heard around the conservation service is an example. Often when you’re conducting investigations in certain spaces, the action does not need to be taken immediately. The investigations are conducted over time. Evidence is gathered. Trends are observed. A lot of it is disruption. It is prevention. So the exigent circumstances really are not something that is sort of activated on a daily basis.

Some of the other groups that we talked about, and there are many…. Their special provincial constable status would be used quite rarely. In other words, seeking a warrant or swearing in information would be something that they would do, probably, very infrequently.

G. Begg: Thanks for the presentation. I wonder if there is an opportunity to clean up the regulations. It keys into something that Adam said that I hadn’t thought of before. Exigent circumstances rarely arise, but we have fully trained policemen, for example, who don’t arrest people or don’t ever hit the road.

Could we clean it up by…? Perhaps everyone who has a badge and a gun, for example, would be covered in those circumstances. We don’t make a distinction between a police officer who doesn’t arrest people because that’s not his job…. He’s just a staffing officer or whatever.

Would it be helpful…? I know I’m asking you for an opinion, but could we clean it up so that it’s very clear that if you’re in northern B.C., where Dan is, and you’re a conservation officer…. I know they do it in Alberta. You brought that to my attention. They actually work with the RCMP. So is there a way that we could clean it up so that there isn’t that ambiguity that, in my mind, still remains?

W. Rideout: Thanks for the question, MLA. I think there is some opportunity. You’ll recall that when our branch testified, gave a presentation to you on a couple of occasions, we talked about a policing and public safety continuum. We talked about an idea that was trying to force multiply public safety through a wide spectrum of resources and leveraging resources to do different functions — not always requiring the fully trained police officer for a lot of functions that are there. I think that continues to be an option.

I think we need to be, also, if I could say, mindful of what we see in the United States, where everybody is out there carrying a gun and conducting law enforcement. We do have to limit that to a large degree, because that becomes a very challenging model to control at the provincial level, where you’ve got people out, perhaps, not trained and/or experienced in certain kinds of investigations and/or interdictions, enforcement actions. Trying to find that balance would be challenging.

I think that there are opportunities to look at where, perhaps, there are bans and/or limits, and then empower special provincial constables within those bans. I would not be a real fan of that being limitless. I think that we know…. For example, we hire people to work in a number of areas who really are experts in, perhaps, money laundering or financial matters. We really want to make sure that we don’t ever put them in circumstances in which they will, perhaps, find themselves in difficult, challenging situations.

I know that’s a bit of a roundabout question. I think there are opportunities to both clean it up and to leverage it, frankly.

G. Begg: We’ve talked and we continue to talk about tiered policing, in other words, uniformed members who perform specialized policing functions. Is that one of the things…?

[7:10 p.m.]

W. Rideout: I think it is. We are about to hear Mr. Jus­tice Cullen come back in May with his recommendations. I think that’s a really good example of when….

We talk about the ability of this province…. All the provinces in Canada have sustainable expertise in key areas like money laundering, like financial crime. Hiring a police officer or utilizing an RCMP officer who is trained to do a multitude of different functions…. The return on investment of that is not good.

They transfer. They move on. We start again. We train again. We start again. So the idea we can create some sustainable expertise in key and specialized areas and people do that for many, many years — they grow; they train; they evolve — is really an excellent way of proceeding.

One of the things that the branch has been doing is working within the OCABC environment. You’ll know that OCABC is a subsidiary, a subset group, of CFSEU-BC in the organized crime space. It is a stand-alone agency that works with and is integrated with the RCMP CFSEU.

A lot of our provincial investments around gangs and guns and in other specialized services like our firearms tracing lab and some of the work we do around tracking…. We’ve put the investments into OCABC because we can hire exactly what you’re talking about. We hire people with specific skills and expertise and experience, and they’re not subject to transfer and moving around the province.

Again, a long answer but yes.

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): Thanks, again, for the presentation, all of you.

As Garry said, when I first got on to this committee, I was overwhelmed with the number of people that are peace officers or special…. I mean, I had no idea that there were that many people that actually had that designation. So certainly, the cleaning-up aspect and the opportunity of tightening it up a little bit I think is a good idea.

Two questions. One is…. You talked about a special peace officer, I guess it was, designation that’s given from time to time to…. You made it sound like…. They’re not on this list, but it gives you the authority to give that to someone. What are those examples? What would that be?

W. Rideout: A really good example is, perhaps, the city of Calgary police. Perhaps they’re investigating a homicide that happened in the city of Calgary, but suspects and witnesses are in British Columbia.

Unlike the RCMP, they don’t have a national authority. They only operate in the province of Alberta under the Alberta act. So in order to operate as peace officers here, they have to be given temporary special provincial constable status, which we do based on their request, the fact pattern, the authorization of their chief. That’s what, primarily, it’s for.

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): That would be the same case for overseas or anything like that as well. Or is that just within Canada that you can give that authority?

W. Rideout: We would not be giving overseas or even people like our American colleagues who operate here in Canada…. Often they don’t get the same status. That’s for Canadian jurisdictions.

When the RCMP operates abroad, it operates under agreements with foreign countries and as more of an observer. They operate almost as observers. They really have no legal authorities.

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): Okay. You talked about the designated law enforcement units, the special constables and then the statutory enforcement officers. You have them listed, specifically the commercial vehicle safety and the sheriffs.

Do they have the full, I guess…? I’m just looking at these other pieces, and I wonder where they kind of fit in. I’d almost put them at…. I think Adam kind of alluded to it. You see someone in that uniform. They’ve got handcuffs and everything else. You automatically categorize them as a peace officer fulfilling a policing role.

You put them as statutory enforcement officers. I’m just wondering why they’re so separate, as sheriffs who are detaining people, and CVSE, obviously, to a lesser extent, but still the ability to pull vehicles over and to engage almost police-like. I’m just curious about how that got like that.

[7:15 p.m.]

W. Rideout: Yeah. The CVSE is an interesting one. Of course, we’ve seen a lot of convoy protests in recent weeks and months, which brought with it the threat of these big rigs. We looked at options on enforcement, and they’re really not there. The powers that are afforded the CVSC…

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): CVSE.

W. Rideout: I get it wrong every time.

…are very limited to the inspections. The enforcement can be done under, I believe, three acts. It’s squarely in there.

They really, truly are not what we would largely see and view as police officers. They’re not trained to that extent. They haven’t been hired…. They have no real expectations that they’re going to be in confrontations with people, as one example. It’s a very specific space. They need that status in order to do some of the specific work they do, but it’s not broad.

Same with the sheriffs. The sheriffs have very limited authorities. It is very rare you’ll see a sheriff’s vehicle even use a blue or red light on a car. Their ability to engage in what we call “emergency vehicle operations” is extremely limited.

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): Just a follow-up to that last comment. Interesting. During the floods this past summer, CVSEs were used to control traffic. I understand there were some issues, people basically saying: “You have no authority to stop me.” They were right. They did not have that.

Was there anything done as a result of some of those complaints that happened this summer? How does one fix that? What’s your ability in the ministry to fix that on the fly? I mean, that was obviously something that was extreme. Is there that ability to add powers to these other categories?

W. Rideout: I have no ability. In those instances, the states of emergency were declared. They then have authorities that come with the state of emergency, both with the COVID enforcement and floods and fires. When there are states of emergency, there are other pieces that go into play.

From a strategy, from a pragmatic perspective, what the ministry does with its policing partners and with MOTI and the other ministries is look to force, multiply and leverage. CVSE and the Ministry of Transportation were on those locations. We’d have RCMP highway patrol there, as well, to try to, again, force, multiply. They work very effectively at traffic control and routing vehicles and getting them through and all the rest of it.

We were very fortunate. Yes, there was some of that, but there was also a tremendous amount of cooperation from the general public.

There is really not much power we have to enhance anybody’s authority in a rapid way in cases such as you describe — fires, floods, COVID. States of emergency give additional…. My colleagues here were very heavily engaged in some of those modifications and enforcement powers under states of emergency.

The strategy has traditionally been to seek public coop­eration and limit enforcement. Actually, we were really quite successful with not having to do much enforcement at all.

I know that’s not your question. They’re not well positioned to be on the front lines. That doesn’t mean that they’re not highly skilled, capable professionals, but that’s not their function. That’s not what they were hired for. That’s not what they were trained to do.

D. Routley (Chair): Thank you, Members. Anybody else on the letter and the subject at hand? I think we might have a few other questions.

Garry, I think you had one.

G. Begg: You’re a retired assistant commissioner to the RCMP. Can we stray a bit into your observations over the years?

This committee, of course, is looking at, broadly speaking….

D. Routley (Chair): If we could just wait for a minute. This meeting is a public meeting.

G. Begg: Yeah.

One of the things that we’re looking at is, obviously, the delivery of policing services in British Columbia and our ability to impact or affect the delivery of that service. We’ve heard evidence and taken testimony from people who are concerned about how cumbersome that becomes at times because of the national implications for the RCMP.

[7:20 p.m.]

I wonder if you have any comments or observations that you would make, based upon your experience about what we would call nimbleness. You’ve alluded to some of them in your previous statement about the transfer of talent, that kind of thing.

That’s come up several times on this committee. I wonder if you would be inclined or would feel comfortable making a general comment about how we can best impact the delivery of police services in British Columbia to British Columbians.

W. Rideout: Certainly, I’d be happy to.

As you said, MLA, I spent 34½ years in the RCMP. I joined the RCMP when I was 19 years old, and it’s been my life. For the last six years, I’ve worked for the Ministry of Public Safety in the policing and security branch, so I’ve had the benefit of sort of seeing more like a broader, more strategic view of things.

In my view, as far as the men and women in the RCMP on the street — exceptional police officers, exceptionally trained, exceptionally recruited, very, very capable. Their investigative capacity, their ability to deliver successful results on complex investigations is second to none.

I differentiate between policing and the business of policing. I think British Columbia deserves to have more control of its own public safety destiny. Within the current contractual arrangement, one that will expire in 2032, we are limited within that destiny, based on the agreement and the confines of that agreement.

The RCMP national headquarters, which I differ from the provincial headquarters, and the relationship with Public Safety Canada and the contractual obligations…. We benefit from that arrangement: municipally 10 percent contribution comes from Canada, provincially 30 percent. There is a financial benefit that is significant on a half-billion-dollar provincial policing budget. That’s a lot of money. But it limits us. That 30 percent comes at a cost, in my view. I’m giving you my personal opinion now, not my….

I think that British Columbia should strive to better control its own public safety destiny in the future. There are multiple ways to do that, not the least of which is to strongly encourage the RCMP itself to evolve to better meet the province’s needs rather than, if you will, throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

It’s not sustainable in its current form. The world is evolving. Expectations are evolving. Crime is evolving. Violence is evolving. Judicial requirements are evolving. The model is not sustainable.

You may also be aware that the federal Minister of Public Safety’s mandate letter from the government indicates a review of contract policing in Canada. That came this year. What that will entail is yet to be determined, but it seems to me that Canada itself is looking at whether it wants to be in the business of contract policing. We need to be alive to that, because it seems to suggest that it, itself, recognizes the need to modernize.

When I say contract policing, that is the service pro­vided to provinces and territories, not the federal overlap service.

All policing is complicated. Independent municipal pol­icing is complicated, and multiple police departments within geographical boundaries is complicated as well. Replacing all municipal RCMP with independent police departments has got a whole host of its own problems as well.

I believe that those that follow me and the Minister of Public Safety should be able to evolve the most significant policing presence in the province in a way that’s consistent with the expectations of British Columbia and not have to negotiate with Canada and others to make that happen.

[7:25 p.m.]

G. Begg: Could I ask one more question? It’s related.

We’ve struggled, as well, with metrics or measurement tools or how you assess policing. How do we know that we’re being policed at an adequate level?

One of the areas surrounds specialty units. We’re not only concerned about the metrics, but we’re concerned about the oversight or lack of oversight — for example, of CFSEU or Gang Task Force or IHIT or agencies that evolve or devolve the policing system into a sort of patchwork quilt of the provision of police services over city boundaries, that kind of thing.

What do you suggest would be a way that part of the provincial police program should include accountability measurement tools by which their performance or strength can be measured? Do those tools exist? The example that I think of, of course, is the Gang Task Force, or IHIT. Do we know how successful IHIT is? Do we know how successful the Gang Task Force is? Is it reasonable to expect, if you have the Gang Task Force, that gangster activity dissipates and that it’s measurable?

What are the metrics that could be applied to policing?

W. Rideout: Thanks, MLA. The branch has done some really interesting leading-edge work in this area, so I’m really glad you asked the question.

As you heard me say in the last question, I distinguish between the B.C. RCMP and the national RCMP. The B.C. RCMP have been very cooperative in our efforts to achieve and obtain what I would call return-on-investment metrics and/or social-economic return-on-investment metrics. This is an area of work that we’ve undertaken in the organized crime space, and now we’re expanding out across the province. Again, I have to point out that the B.C. RCMP has been very supportive of this work.

I think what we need to do…. When we assign our annual delegations to the RCMP, financial delegations, we send with it performance metrics, expectations on reporting and achieving. But the idea that we’re measuring how many guns are seized or how much cocaine has been seized in a locker really is becoming less and less of an indicator.

What we’re looking to measure in a meaningful way is: does that effort or that project or that work of CFSEU over the course of a six-month period against a particular, say, the Lower Mainland gang conflict…? That financial investment in the unit that is there — is it having a demonstrable difference to the problem?

When we look at policing and costs…. We have done some really interesting research, and we can give you the numbers for our seized organized crime dollar. If we seize $1 of organized crime money…. Say we go into a house, and we seize $100,000. We know, and we’ve done studies, that the relative return on investment, the crime-prevention value of that seizure is 11 to 1, approximately.

We know that if we seize an illegal gun — not just any gun but a gun that’s desired by gangsters, and we do that through proactive work — that the return on investment for that seizure…. The investment in policing dollars may be, say, $100,000 in totality.

We know that seizing that gun that will be used 11 times approximately — it’s used in a murder or in an act of violence — prevents the socioeconomic cost to society of hospitalizations, people out of work, court costs, hospital costs, grief costs, and it goes on exponentially. We need to begin to evaluate and monitor and assign policing and Public Safety dollars not all that differently than Health does it when they allocate funds.

[7:30 p.m.]

We are looking for: are people healthier? Are they safer? Are people…? For example, certain types of illnesses — are they being reduced by the efforts that we are causing to occur, as opposed to being reactive and that we’ve got a collective and total plan in place as to how to, if you will, combat the problem at hand?

So financial delegations go out. There’s a plan in place, and then we measure it — not sporadic, meaningless metrics but real results as to whether that societal problem has been impacted.

Equally, I think we have to be more accountable to the police. We ask the police to do an awful lot in society. Court decision after court decision after court decision changes the requirements of policing and law enforcement, but we don’t give the police any more money or people. Hospitals close, more people on the streets for mental health and addictions, homelessness coexisting — all of those issues on the street, causing more downstream impacts on policing, and we give them nothing.

It doesn’t work. What you’re doing when those issues hit…. When you take them away from proactive, preventative, strategic, intelligence-led work to be reactive to these societal problems or judicial decisions, they’re not getting ahead of the problem. They’re chasing it. For multiple generations on the health front, the police are chasing those issues.

I’m not saying it’s not important; it’s critically important. People’s wellness, community safety, community perception — all of it is critical, but it’s not part of a strategic plan. We do not fund the police. In fact, we’ve just gone through two years of sort of a model of defund the police. But it will not work. It will not work without the other enablers being raised at the same time.

I fear that we tend to always want to solve these problems through policing, and it’s not going to happen. Again, another long-winded — I apologize — response, but it’s very complicated. We need to have a strategic plan for policing. We need to have performance metrics. This branch has done some tremendous work on performance. We have very innovative….

To be fair, the police are working with us on that, and they’ve embraced it. It’s baby steps, and it’s slow. It’s hard slugging, but we’re getting there. A lot of the systems that are established, at least within the bigger departments, are not really designed to automatically capture that, so a lot of it’s manual. IT systems and reporting have to meet that. So when you’re establishing performance metrics, their systems have to meet it in order to perform — also easier done with a provincial force than, say, the RCMP.

But we need to do a better job around meeting the needs of police. The police, traditionally, historically through my career and even today…. I watch them be tasked with one thing after another after another. The police are very good at going out and getting the job done, but they’re losing ground. They’re losing ground, because everything has gotten way more complicated than it used to be.

When you talk about police oversight, absolutely. Effective policing needs effective police governance. That means effective police boards. We have got a lot of work to do around police boards and police board governance, around effective oversight bodies.

The RCMP has the CRCC and the OPCC. We have them. It also requires sort of an understanding of policing and public safety within the broader community health and wellness context. I think that often they’re just left out of the conversation, and they sit there and have to deal with whatever people decide and a whole bunch of other decisions. Now everyone is scrambling to figure it out.

R. Singh: Thank you so much for the presentation. You have touched upon quite a few things that I was going to talk about. We, as a committee, have been hearing from people for almost 15 months now — now in the deliberation mode — issues that at first we thought whether they exist. Now we know that they are part of the colonial systems that we have, and policing is not immune to that. One issue that has come up over and over again is systemic racism.

[7:35 p.m.]

We have heard from people on how policing is not working for them, and not just today. It has not worked for them in generations. I’m sure the staff has been following the conversations very closely. A lot is expected from this committee, because it’s a historic moment for us to bring in the change that many, especially the marginalized communities, are looking for.

What do you see? Obviously, we as a committee will be doing up our deliberations and our recommendations, but what do you see for policing to work for everybody, not just for a few people, but for every British Columbian having an equal right to policing, justice and equality?

W. Rideout: Well, it’s critical. That’s the basic premise of policing, and always has been. I think what’s unfortunately happened is policing has, for a variety of reasons, lost the confidence of our community in some of these areas. The idea that systemic racism doesn’t exist in policing is completely wrong. Of course it does. It exists in every element of our organizations and society, so I think it’s there.

I think what needs to take place is…. I’m hoping, like many of my colleagues, that the work of this committee, as you say, will be historic, will be transformational and provide the enablers for change. When we talk about things like systemic racism, public confidence in policing and a broader…. You’re absolutely correct that everybody should be able to call the police and not fear and not be worried and have trust. This is critically important.

I think that many of the things we’ve talked about this evening and before are what I would describe as enablers for us to get there. There’s certain things that have to be fixed in policing and in the Police Act. We know that there’s many recommendations that we would probably look to hope to make in the Police Act, if that comes to fruition.

This is not just an opportunity. It’s probably the only opportunity, certainly in the time I’ve been visible to such things and looking forward to making those types of changes. I think we’re all optimistic, hopeful, and that this is the time. I don’t pretend to have all the answers on how we can effect that change. I think that the police leadership people that I work with and my team works with every day will embrace the recommendations, and they will do their very best to make change.

My guess is…. I’m sure “guess” is not what a committee wants to hear, but it’s going to take some time. It’s not the kind of change that’s going to happen overnight, and I think what we do or what you’ll do is set certain principles and expectations.

As leadership evolves and as departments evolve, as unions evolve, and as the next generation sort of emerges into those leadership roles, they will only emerge into those leadership roles if they embrace those concepts, because they cannot be successful as the next chief or the next inspector or the next assistant commissioner unless they do walk the talk.

I don’t think we’re going to flip a switch and it’s going to happen overnight.

R. Singh: Really appreciate that. Thank you so much.

D. Davies (Deputy Chair): This has been very valuable. I appreciate the conversation.

Embarrassingly, I have not looked at the mandate letter to the federal minister, which I have just pulled up now and read. There’s a lot of interesting little tidbits in there that I didn’t know was happening, but the one that you brought up was about assessing contract policing with the provinces. I understand that it’s not even been a year yet, but has there been any discussion? Has the federal government reached out? Has there been any engagement at all to this point regarding what contracting may look like moving down the road?

W. Rideout: The short answer — and I’m not prone to short, as you’ve probably already detected — is very little. I think even at the national level, they’re trying to figure out what that means. But I do think it is a signal, and something from a provincial level we should be mindful of. This province is more heavily invested in contract policing than any other province in the country. We are reliant on it, and we should be at least eyes wide open for the future.

There’s a couple of other converging factors, and I think we provided some additional submissions to the committee since we last spoke, in addition to that item, with a review of contract policing. In this province, I believe there’s about 6,500 RCMP officers. All but about 1,000 of those are contract policing, whether it be municipal or provincial resources, so it is a sizeable presence here that will be pursuant to their contract.

[7:40 p.m.]

The other piece that’s critically important, when you look at the future of policing in this province and the im­pacts of policing in this province, is the fact that the RCMP has become unionized since we were last with you, and the collective agreement has been signed. RCMP officers have rightly received relative parity with their municipal counterparts. It’s not exact parity, but they were way behind for years and years.

That raises the costs significantly both for the province and for the municipal participants. That cost is at a 70 percent split. It goes downstream to anybody contracting the RCMP. So that is another factor when you look forward. If you’re any city, and your costs were X under the old agreement, you now have to at least consider…. It was inevitable, and the cities all knew it, but the RCMP officers are now getting paid closer to what their municipal counterparts are. As such, policing costs just went up in your city. The average is about 21 percent — for a constable — increase.

But we have to be mindful of the fact that that is just the first collective agreement — more to come. So between now and 2032, the RCMP and the National Police Federation will conduct negotiations with Canada. And we expect that those…. The first agreement pretty much squarely dealt with pay parity. We will see some future cost parity around senior ranks, which are grossly disproportionate at this point. It has been a challenge for the RCMP to maintain its ranks because these officers leave and go to other departments.

In future agreements, we should expect to see more focus by the union — rightly so — on member wellness, member health, areas in which we will see changes to how many officers can be in a detachment at a time. So detachments that, in this province, perhaps are policed by two or three officers may require four or five in order to meet the union agreement. This will also increase policing costs provincially, not so much municipally.

We will see that certain functions that are covered under the current contract may not be covered in future contracts because they’re no longer deemed to be something that Canada wishes to participate in. I talk about, like, integrated teams. We enjoy the benefit of that 30 percent contribution for integrated teams in this province. There are no guarantees that that will be maintained. It may well be, but we don’t know.

There are a number of challenges and uncertainties on the horizon. Where is Canada going with contract policing? What will these union agreements mean for communities that rely on the RCMP now? Will that 30 percent contribution offset the pros and cons that come with that? I think that in many cases it will, because when it gets to rural policing, it’s a very challenging environment to provide a provincial service for. But we have a seen a shift in the last year with that focus on Canada and with that union.

Benefits will come. When we talk about member wellness and health and benefits, that’s also a positive, because we have high numbers of officers off with illness and stress and PTSD. So those things need to be factored in, but it will change policing in the future.

D. Routley (Chair): Members, any more questions?

We ask such small questions. Big, big questions and great answers. It’s been very valuable to have your reflections and the information that you brought to us but also this opportunity for people to, I think, tie up a lot of ends here. Thank you.

W. Rideout: Thank you for having us. I’m really looking forward to the 28th, I believe it is.

D. Routley (Chair): Yes. With many thanks on behalf of the committee members, we will now take a recess.

The committee recessed from 7:45 p.m. to 7:54 p.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): We’ve got the documents in front of us here.

I ask for a motion to go in camera.

From Garry, seconded by Adam.

Motion approved.

The committee continued in camera from 7:54 p.m. to 8:51 p.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): We are public.

Now could someone give me a motion to adjourn the motion, please?

Dan, seconded by Rachna.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 8:51 p.m.