No Easy Ride: Reflections on My Life in the RCMP (30 page)

Corporal Snow’s mission was to arrange for the lodging and board of two constables and their horses on our farm. We were by no means an unruly lot, and it was no reflection upon us or our community that two policemen were being billeted on us. We lived close to the Dakota border, and a chain of police posts was being established along the international boundary. They were not designed to resist an American invasion, but to discourage the tendency of settlers to ignore the boundary altogether, especially with respect to those commodities which could be bought cheaper south of the Line. In the 1880’s, of which I write, something approaching the ideal of free trade had been clandestinely achieved by the good people of Manitoba and Dakota.

Corporal Snow had no difficulty in completing his arrangements, and soon after two policemen, who shall remain unnamed, arrived to take up their duties. These duties were not particularly arduous; they consisted mainly of keeping posts east and west advised of a threatened visit by the inspector. This piece of public service was reciprocal, with posts east and west keeping them equally advised. An incidental duty was to patrol the Boundary Line once a week. As this invisible line between two great nations was quite unfenced and almost unmarked, the effectiveness of such a patrol in restraining the free trade sentiment of the settlers may be imagined. I can recall only one seizure being made. It consisted of several loads of fresh fish captured in good Canadian waters and being exported without permit. The constables had no difficulty in seizing the fish, but as they could not find a buyer, disposal of the illicit stock presented a problem. And fresh fish, like time and tide, are notoriously opposed to undue delay.

When not engaged in the above and associated duties, our policemen cultivated the social grace of story-telling. I admired the police; had I been a girl I would surely have said they were beautiful. With their scarlet tunics, their belts filled with threatening cartridge—rifle cartridges for long range work; .44 revolver bullets for the murderous hand-to-hand business—their dark blue trousers with the wide yellow stripe, and collar-box caps perched airily on their heads one inch above the left eyebrow, in beauty they seemed to me greater than all the lilies of the field, and in authority next only to the Queen. Small wonder their eight-year-old audience sat with mouth agape far into the night! It did not then occur to me that beings so divine could take liberties with the star-like chastity of Truth. Alas, that the passing years dissolve so many illusions!

It is interesting to surmise what Corporal Snow and Corporal Joe Parsons would think about today’s RCMP. They would be astounded by the appearance of women in policing and even more shocked when they learned that there already had been a female commissioner. I suspect their reaction would not be favourable.

Their eyes would roll at the sight of the personal equipment and combat-like clothing donned by a patrolling member. Where are the spurs? Where are the boots? What happened to the unique brown jacket and that terribly impractical pea jacket? The utility belt worn by members would certainly have reminded my father of old Batman comics. The ability to communicate instantly might make them ask, “What happened to independence?” Of course, the salary would appear to them exorbitant, as would the excessive time off and benefits like overtime, and—God forbid—maternity and paternity leave. What happened to single men? How can the Force operate without a cadre of people they can send anywhere at any time? Where are the horses? They would be mystified by the presence of personnel whose only job is to look after the welfare of serving members. And what happened to having to sign “Your Obedient Servant” on all reports?

The RCMP would appear cold and mechanized to them. Much of the personal, human component that they knew has been obliterated, and the speed, intensity and volume of criminal activity would overwhelm them. I believe they would look at one another and hurry off back to the early 20th century.

During the summer of 2010, I visited Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump, located near Fort Macleod in southwestern Alberta. It is a museum and monument dedicated to Canada’s first peoples and a way of life that has long since disappeared. It is an impressive edifice, and in spite of the numbers of tourists who visit the site, it is also a spiritual place that every Canadian should see at least once. For at least 5,500 years, the Native people of the area hunted buffalo here. They approached the massive animals on foot and herded them toward the edge of a high cliff. They were stampeded at the last moment, so the momentum of the herd took the animals over to their deaths. The women and children waited at the bottom to butcher prime animals for their choice parts. The site was abandoned in the 19th century after European contact, and by the mid-1880s the buffalo had been hunted almost to extinction, largely by professional hunters. Today, the animal that sustained the First Nations people and dominated the prairie ecosystem for millennia has been reduced to a smattering of herds located in protected areas of western Canada.

As I peered at the cliff where untold numbers of buffalo were herded to their deaths, another icon of the Canadian west came to mind: the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. From my earliest childhood, this worthy and durable organization has been a fundamental building block of my life. As a family member from a younger generation, Constable Adam Giesbrecht, Lynne’s son, embarks on his RCMP career, one would think his future would be assured, as the demise of the RCMP seems as unlikely as did the disappearance of the plains buffalo, one of the symbols of the RCMP. However, perhaps there is an ominous similarity between the buffalo and the RCMP. Once the buffalo were pointed in the direction of the cliff, the run was commenced. The momentum was so great that nothing could prevent their rush over the precipice. Like the buffalo, the RCMP seem to be heading for the cliff. Momentum is building, and they soon may be over the edge.

How could this happen? What is precipitating this potential tragedy? The main reason is clear: a growing population and the increasing complexity of Canadian society have overwhelmed our frontier police force. Historically, when Corporal Snow patrolled in southern Manitoba, the Force accepted and discharged all facets of policing in the Canadian west. No matter what the request, this versatile body of men—now men and women—accepted the task and usually carried it out successfully. The mindset of the Mounted Police has always been “Never say ‘no’” Even if the task overburdened the troops, the job was undertaken without question, and every effort was expended to meet challenges. This was the case when the RCMP expanded municipal responsibilities from small prairie communities to large cities after taking over provincial policing in BC. In the early 1950s, the RCMP began policing the municipality of Burnaby, BC, the first of several very large municipal details in the Lower Mainland. The logistics of supplying human resources for these operations were extremely taxing and sapped the Force in many other areas. Learning the trade of “big city policing” has been a long and difficult road, and many operations still run shorthanded in an effort to feed the monster consuming human resources in southern British Columbia.

As Canada began the transition to a multicultural society and the country’s population increased, more cracks and fissures began to appear. The basic paramilitary infrastructure of the Force did not change, and the RCMP continued to be responsible for all levels of policing from coast to coast. Provincial contracts demanded more and more resources, as did growing municipal contracts. Our frontier police force continued to strive to be all things to all people in what was becoming a very diversified country.

RCMP administrators were loath to lobby governments to increase resources and generally tried to deal with inadequacies internally. During the 20th century, the Force operated on a shoestring. Most of the commissioners of the day prided themselves on coming in under budget at the conclusion of the fiscal year. The Force was perennially held up as an organization that functioned economically. This parsimony was, of course, at the cost of individual members. Salaries were dismal and reimbursement of on-the-job expenses was almost unheard of. Working conditions—police buildings and vehicles—were always basic. Heaters in cars were only allowed as late as the ’50s. Commercial radios of any kind were not allowed in police vehicles, and on the rare occasion that one would appear so equipped, the radio would be removed. Air conditioning was not installed in vehicles until the late ’60s. Members on patrol in winter conditions did so in high leather boots with spurs that conducted the cold, and until the 1960s, the winter overcoat was an unlined pea jacket, virtually useless in forty below temperatures. The alternative was a large, bulky buffalo coat that rendered the wearer impotent in any situation that required agility. An organization that should have functioned with efficiency, effectiveness and economy largely ignored the first two important goals in the interest of the third.

As long as RCMP members worked overtime hours without pay, the Force was able to assume additional mandates with insufficient personnel. But when overtime compensation was introduced in 1976, detachment and unit commanders were forced to cope with finite human resource budgets. For the first time in the Force’s history, investigations began to be prioritized. It became obvious that there were insufficient human resources to carry out mandated responsibilities.

The important and necessary addition of women to the RCMP, beginning in 1974, necessitated the introduction of maternity leave; however, female members on leave were not replaced and each time a vacancy occurred on the worksite because of pregnancy, remaining personnel were required to work extra hours. This caused resentment, insults and innuendo directed toward women on the job and set the stage for further deterioration of morale and more instances of stress leave.

During the 1970s, the RCMP attempted to balance their overwhelming workloads with the additional responsibility for Canada’s national security. This caused serious shortcomings. Perhaps for the first time, the RCMP was challenged and scrutinized by a civilian entity. The McDonald Commission was appointed by the federal government in 1977 to examine serious flaws in how the RCMP was functioning at the national security level. While the Force carried a mandate to detect political subversion within the country, this was done by an entity completely separate from the criminal investigation component. R.H. Simmonds, the commissioner of the day, closely monitored McDonald Commission activity to ensure it did not extend its tentacles into what was referred to as the Criminal Investigation Branch side of the Force. If it were not for his stewardship of the organization during this extremely stressful period, the Force might have found itself compromised beyond repair.

The commission examined and substantiated a number of allegations against the RCMP Security Service, including theft of a Parti Québécois membership list, break-ins, illegal opening of mail and the burning of a barn in Quebec where the FLQ (Front de Libération du Québec) was holding meetings. Following the recommendations of the commission, Security Services were removed from the jurisdiction of the RCMP. At no time did the Force relinquish this responsibility voluntarily. It was arbitrarily removed, and CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service) was formed in 1984.

In the 1980s, the federal government decided that the RCMP commissioner would become part of the government as a deputy minister. This was perhaps the single worst management decision to have been made by government regarding the RCMP. Objectivity has been lost, and independence from the federal government of the day has been subverted. The commissioner must now deal with another level of bureaucracy, which involves adhering to government regulations and participating in social justice experiments such as recruiting quotas for women and visible minorities, as well as being encumbered by federal policies on hiring and firing. This lack of independence means that decisions are not always made based on the Force’s identified needs.

In December 2007, the Task Force on Governance and Cultural Change in the RCMP, chaired by David Brown, QC, released a report that recommended 49 internal changes. Even so, there are few executives at the upper echelon of the RCMP or any politicians who have focused on the essential problem: multijurisdictional saturation. Instead, lofty policy statements and a “Change Management Team” appointed by management speak of elevating professionalism, improving the management environment and tasking individual members to “meet the challenge.” Meanwhile, RCMP detachments across the country are overstressed daily and under pressure to do more with less.

With advances in computer technology there has been considerable experimentation with command decentralization. Subdivisions have been expanded into districts, which generally divide provinces in half. The results of these changes have yet to be proven, but it is clear that the Force is still struggling to find the most effective organizational structures.

In recent years the sterling reputation of the Force has been sullied badly. The 2007 tasering death of Polish immigrant Robert Dziekanski at Vancouver International Airport and revelations made at the subsequent Braidwood Inquiry into the tragic incident have been a searing scandal for the RCMP and the beginning of a litany of discrediting incidents that have soiled the name of the Force. Too many examples of professional misconduct, particularly in the province of BC, are leading many Canadians to feel that the RCMP is in need of radical realignment.

The treatment of women within the Force has also been the subject of much scrutiny. The organization I joined was male dominated, and my working life with policewomen was confined to supervising and managing in the latter part of my career. Perhaps my intuition failed me, but I did not detect abuse of female members in the workplace. In fairness to the RCMP, women are still finding their way in the profession, even in police forces that have had women in their ranks for generations. It has taken time for women to carve their own place in the bizarre world of law enforcement, and many of them have been subject to suggestive and even insulting language. Those who survive the tough “battlefield” police environment possess the skills to cope verbally, often humorously, or by demanding change from their work partners. I have witnessed women doing so and receiving a positive and respectful response.