Brian Purdy (Calgary Herald) – No province has a greater connection to the RCMP than Alberta. It was in Alberta that the famous Long March ended when a brave contingent of the North West Mounted Police arrived in Fort Macleod in 1874. They were Alberta’s first police force, charged originally with cleaning up the whiskey trade with the Indians. They continued to police Alberta after it became a province in 1905, until 1917. Then Alberta created its own Alberta Provincial Police, which enforced all but federal law until 1932. The RCMP continued in Alberta during that period, enforcing federal law.
In 1932 the RCMP became a contract police force, and the Alberta Provincial Police, which had largely been staffed by former RCMP members, was disbanded. The Alberta government had been persuaded that the RCMP could enforce the law at less cost than the provincial police, so it signed a 20-year contract for the RCMP to police Alberta. That contract was renewed in 1952, 1972, 1992, and is coming up for renewal in 2012, less than two years from now.
There is an additional price for RCMP policing that is not evident in the contract. The headquarters of the RCMP is in Ottawa. The authority and structure of the RCMP is governed by a federal statute, the RCMP Act. All RCMP members are ultimately responsible to the Ottawa senior brass, not to anyone in Alberta. All training, operations, discipline and procedures are set
by Ottawa, not Edmonton. Alberta does not control its police under the contract policing system.
For decades, the RCMP created and polished a justified image of competence and integrity. Unfortunately in recent years that image has lost a lot of its polish. Under Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli, who resigned in disgrace after giving what is delicately known as contradictory evidence before a parliamentary committee, the public saw a serious decline in RCMP training, discipline, integrity and internal investigations. When members of the public were killed by RCMP under dubious conditions, the RCMP investigated itself and found little wrong. RCMP members lied to public inquiries. Those same inquiries found systemic and individual incompetence. Various individual RCMP members were charged with personal crimes ranging from drunk driving causing death, to spousal murder.
During the Olympics this winter, Ottawa headquarters stripped thousands of RCMP members from the provinces, including Alberta, to provide security in Vancouver. The provinces had no say in the reduction of service. The latest news reports are that there is a revolt in Ottawa by senior RCMP officers against the present civilian Commissioner, William Elliott. Such things were never part of the RCMP history, but they are now.
This leaves Alberta Premier Ed Stelmach with a problem. If he signs a new 20-year contract with the RCMP for Alberta, will he be locking us in to a declining police force which does not serve Alberta well? Should Alberta be looking at a renewed Alberta Provincial Police to enforce the law in Alberta, leaving the RCMP to deal with federal, interprovincial and international cases and provide specialized forensic services in a similar manner to the FBI in the United States? After all, the FBI doesn’t hand out speeding tickets in the U.S.
Could we have more confidence in the police if they were responsible to, and under the authority of, the Alberta government rather than an Ottawa headquarters?
Where would Alberta Provincial Police force officers come from? The first group would undoubtedly come from the ranks of the RCMP, just as they did back in 1917. After that we would train police cadets ourselves, in the way we
want them trained. Would there be bad apples in a new Alberta Provincial Police? Sure, but the difference is that it would be Alberta that investigates and disciplines them and it would be Alberta that makes the changes to improve the apple barrel.
What would it cost to make the change? That’s the Stelmach government’s job to figure out, and tell us honestly and fairly. Ontario and Quebec have had their own provincial police for decades, and since Alberta sends billions of dollars each year to other provinces, surely we are now in a position to take control of our own policing just as those two other provinces have.
With the contract renewal on the horizon, we should demand that the Premier give serious and public consideration to the alternative of an Alberta Provincial Police, and to do his duty to Albertans by not thoughtlessly signing a 20-year renewal.
Brian Purdy is a Queen’s Counsel who spent more than 30 years working in criminal law, primarily with the RCMP. He is a retired General Counsel with the federal Department of Justice, and lives in Calgary.
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