Police privatization proposed

Cop union wary of new police legislation allowing contracting out to private companies

New legislation that would overhaul policing in Ontario has the union representing Niagara Regional Police officers concerned.

Among the dozens of clauses and sub-clauses in the Safer Ontario Act — sweeping legislation that would replace the existing Police Services Act — are provisions that will allow police services boards to contract out some policing functions to private companies.

Canine services, forensics, crime scene analysis and even the interception of private communications in the course of an investigation, can be contracted out to non-police personnel.

Cliff Priest, president of the Niagara Region Police Association, said it is a path to disaster.

“This isn’t good for communities,” said Cliff Priest, president of the Niagara Region Police Association. “I don’t want to be policed by people who don’t have the oversight and training as our members do.”

Priest said sworn officers are responsible to the public through a system of oversight that includes the chief of police, the police services board, the Ontario Civilian Police Commission and, under the terms of the new act, a provincial inspector general.

Police officers are trained and sworn to uphold the law and, in the case of specialized services like forensics, have to acquire specific certifications and uphold certain standards.

Private companies answer to their shareholders, aren’t accountable to the public and are driven by profit, he said.

Priest said he is concerned that if policing functions are farmed out to non-police officers, the risk of something going wrong will increase.

“As an example, our officers are trained on how to give evidence in a court room. If that evidence is not presented properly it could jeopardize the prosecution,” Priest said. “There are also issues with the continuity of evidence. And what happens if a contractor changes jobs and isn’t available to testify in court, or the board decides to hire another firm?”

If a private contractor does something wrong — be it handling evidence or using force improperly — sworn officers will have to intervene, he said.

The push to privatize some police functions has gained some political support in Ontario and is seen as a cost-cutting measure.

In August, the Association of Municipalities of Ontario, said police services have to “modernize” to allow civilians to perform “non-core” policing functions to save money.

Priest, however, said beyond accountability and training issues, there is no guarantee that private contractors would save money. A forensic analyst with the same training as a police officer won’t come cheap.

Niagara police services board chairman Bob Gale said he hasn’t had a chance to closely examine the Safer Ontario Act. The board’s lawyer is expected to present a report on the act.

However, Gale said he is aware of the position taken by AMO and others that some police functions could be contracted out.

“You could look at something like traffic, where you don’t need a fully trained police officer,” he said. “However, as a board, we would not do anything without first consulting the chief of police. He is responsible for operations.”

Gale said he believes the board’s primary function is to represent Niagara residents and has to consider any measure that would be good for the community.

NRP Chief Bryan MacCulloch was not available for comment Friday.

St. Catharines MPP Jim Bradley said the act is not in its final form. It will be sent to a committee that will hear opinions on the legislation from interested stakeholders, including police services, unions and municipal governments.

Bradley declined to state his own view on the matter, save to say he would present his views to the Liberal caucus and ensure his fellow politicians are aware of the police association’s objections.

Priest said the new legislation doesn’t address a key problem of modern policing — mental health calls.

Presently, police respond to mental health calls because there is no other agency to do the job. However, Priest said police officers are often not the best qualified to deal with those calls, which can consume most of an officer’s shift.

“We aren’t just the call of last resort, we have become the call of only resort,” he said. “These are the sorts of calls our members shouldn’t be responding to, but they have to.”

The act, introduced at Queen’s Park Thursday and represents the first update to the legislation governing police in Ontario in more than 25 years, also includes changes to civilian oversight of police, making it possible to suspend officers without pay.

“The issues faced by police services and their members today are far more complex than when the act was developed,” Community Safety and Correctional Services Minister Marie-France Lalonde said Thursday. “The last time the act was revised, there was no internet, the Blue Jays won the World Series and you needed a briefcase to carry your cellphone.”

Many of the policing updates stem from Appeal Court Justice Michael Tulloch’s report on police oversight, released earlier this year, and include requiring the Special Investigations Unit or SIU, one of the province’s police oversight agencies, to report publicly on all of its investigations and release the names of officers charged.

Attorney General Yasir Naqvi said he has “deep respect and appreciation” for the more than 26,000 police officers in Ontario who risk their lives to keep people safe, but it’s also important to establish checks and balances.

“We have all heard the growing concerns that some communities, in particular, black and Indigenous communities, feel unjustly harmed at the hands of police,” he said. “We have witnessed such tensions across North America and we have learned that Ontario is not immune.”

An Inspector General would be established to oversee police services, with the power to investigate and audit them, and Ontario’s ombudsman would be able to investigate complaints against the police oversight bodies. The three police oversight agencies that already exist in Ontario — the SIU, the Office of the Independent Police Review Director (OIPRD) and the Ontario Civilian Police Commission (OCPC) — would get expanded mandates.

The OIPRD will be renamed the Ontario Policing Complaints Agency and would investigate all public complaints against police officers. The OCPC would be renamed the Ontario Policing Discipline Tribunal, dedicated solely to adjudicating police disciplinary matters, so that isn’t done by the police services themselves.

As well, the SIU would have to be called when an officer fires at a person and would be able to file more charges on its own.