Montreal Gazette

WHAT IF THEY WERE WHITE?

SQ and union solidarity in face of Val-d’Or allegation­s is misplaced

- DAN DELMAR

Quebecers have become accustomed to egregious manoeuvres by labour leaders in the name of “solidarity.” Most are relatively harmless. Juvenile pressure tactics by, among others, Montreal police are more embarrassi­ng than dangerous. But this week, the concept of union solidarity became warped to a point that is undeniably dangerous.

“I’ve known six or seven SQ (Sûreté du Québec) officers who asked me for oral sex,” said one aboriginal woman in Val-d’Or interviewe­d by Radio-Canada’s investigat­ive news program Enquête. “I was so high that I didn’t feel anything, I didn’t care. I wanted money to buy dope.”

She said officers would pay for the acts in cash and/or drugs, and even communicat­e that an extra $100 was to “shut your mouth.”

Others, all indigenous women, alleged systematic, prolonged abuse; the women say they would be driven to the outskirts of Val-d’Or, made to perform oral sex on male officers and, if they refused, left stranded in the woods. There were allegation­s, also, of beatings by police. Complaints to the SQ, in some cases, went unanswered for years.

So now, the SQ finds itself engulfed in allegation­s that paint a rather disturbing picture: A vulnerable group of young, marginaliz­ed women preyed on by members of the only police force in the region available to protect them — a crisis of confidence in law enforcemen­t, by any reasonable person’s definition.

“To say we are in crisis, no, I don’t think so,” declared SQ director general Martin Prud’homme this week, adding “but we have to do something.”

Not to be outdone in insensitiv­ity, the head of the SQ’s union said that calling a public inquiry into the abuse would be an exercise in “burning money” (their views are on the matter aren’t pertinent since their colleagues are suspects).

Pierre Veilleux, president of the Associatio­n des policiers provinciau­x du Québec (APPQ), added that public security minister Lise Thériault “helped to increase the anger of the population toward the police in Quebec” after an emotional press conference where she teared up, as if anger needed to be stoked.

What’s far more irrational than Thériault’s tears is the solidarity exhibited by the SQ and union leadership in the face of multiple allegation­s, multiple suspects and compelling testimony. Even faced with graphic, detailed accounts, SQ leaders choose to repeat tropes about the presumptio­n of innocence and due process.

Veilleux and Prud’homme’s stances actually lack solidarity with the majority of SQ officers who are not predators, and who are presumably hoping for swift justice and the forging of a more cooperativ­e relationsh­ip with Quebec’s indigenous population. And Veilleux’s stance certainly lacks solidarity with the greater labour movement, which should be a progressiv­e, feminist force in any society.

In Quebec, the movement is often commandeer­ed by the questionab­le leadership of macho white bros with nicknames like Rambo; these men aren’t necessaril­y motivated by the sacred duty entrusted to organized labour, but by

power, cronyism and selfpreser­vation.

This “solidarity” Quebec union leaders incessantl­y cite might be heartwarmi­ng if it weren’t also tainted by ethnocentr­ism and chauvinism. This province’s union leadership — monotonous, monotone and composed disproport­ionately of nationalis­ts — too often sacrifices social cohesion in defence of its own narrow interests.

Are Quebecers to believe that if there were similar allegation­s about police officers targeting Val-d’Or’s white, Franco-Catholic women, it would also be downplayed by police and union leadership as speculatio­n, and a public inquiry into the crimes quickly dismissed as “burning money”? As the expression goes, “poser la question c’est y répondre.”

This ‘solidarity’ Quebec union leaders incessantl­y cite might be heartwarmi­ng if it weren’t also tainted by ethnocentr­ism and chauvinism.

Dan Delmar

 ?? JOHN KENNEY/MONTREAL GAZETTE ?? Brenda Michel of the Innu community of Mingan holds a sign at a news conference of Quebec First Nations chiefs who met in Val-d’Or on Tuesday. They want an independen­t inquiry into allegation­s that Sûreté du Québec officers sexually and physically...
JOHN KENNEY/MONTREAL GAZETTE Brenda Michel of the Innu community of Mingan holds a sign at a news conference of Quebec First Nations chiefs who met in Val-d’Or on Tuesday. They want an independen­t inquiry into allegation­s that Sûreté du Québec officers sexually and physically...
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