Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-42, an act to amend the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act.
To begin, I think it is important to note that New Democrats supported the intentions of Bill C-42 to modernize the RCMP and address issues such as sexual harassment and post-traumatic stress disorder in the force, and we voted for the bill to be sent to committee at second reading. However, at the committee stage, it became apparent, after hearing expert witness testimony, that in its current state Bill C-42 remains deeply flawed and will not meet the laudable objectives that New Democrats support in principle, namely to resolve the long-standing issues related to the oversight of the RCMP.
Canadians' confidence in the RCMP has been tested over the past few years as the RCMP has struggled with numerous public scandals. Whether it is the multiple cases of sexual harassment, which have become part of the public discourse surrounding Canada's Mounties, or other issues related to the lack of disciplinary oversight that the force has over its members, Canadians are universal in their support for the need to modernize the oversight provisions that the Commissioner of the RCMP has at his or her disposal.
Bill C-42 purports to streamline the current burdensome process of dealing with conduct and workplace problems, including abuse of authority, intimidation and harassment, by giving the commissioner final authority in deciding what sanctions to impose.
Currently RCMP managers faced with harassment issues have two different processes they must follow. One under Treasury Board policy and one under the RCMP Act. These processes do not always align, which often leads to confusion about rights, responsibilities and available approaches. Under Bill C-42, the commissioner would be granted the authority to establish a single comprehensive system for investigating and resolving harassment concerns.
While Bill C-42 does give more power to the commissioner over discipline and the power to establish a more effective process for dealing with harassment complaints, it remains unclear whether legislation alone can provide the RCMP with the overall culture change that is needed to respond specifically to allegations of widespread sexual harassment. In fact, Commissioner Paulson has publicly stated as much, noting that legislation alone is not enough to keep public trust in the RCMP.
To emphasize the point that legislation alone will not lead to the transformative changes that are truly required to reform the ongoing systemic sexual harassment at the RCMP, I would point to a recent study on sexual harassment within the RCMP in British Columbia, which indicates that problems are significantly under-reported because members are too afraid of reprisal to come forward.
From my perspective, Bill C-42 will not lead to the necessary culture change needed to destigmatize the issue of sexual harassment and ensure that victims of such harassment feel comfortable bringing their issues forward. Simply, the bill does not go far enough in directly addressing the concerns of women serving in the RCMP, who are calling for urgent action to foster a more inclusive and safe environment for women in the force. The word “harassment” still does not appear in Bill C-42 despite NDP attempts to do so.
While the bill has been introduced without the benefit of the findings of the internal general audit of the RCMP ordered by the commissioner, which is currently under way but sadly not yet completed, and while failing to specifically address these obvious concerns, the Conservatives are undertaking an approach that does not make women in the RCMP a priority. That is just wrong, particularly given the ongoing systemic instances of sexual harassment, which are being actively observed on an ongoing basis.
Even more worrisome than neglecting to reference and define harassment in the legislation is the failure to create an oversight body with any teeth, since primary investigations into incidents of death or serious bodily harm would largely be contracted out to provincial or municipal police forces, even though some have no civilian investigation body, or they would still conducted by the RCMP.
Surely if the government was serious about modernizing the RCMP, it would take the next steps and allow binding recommendations from oversight bodies and a full civilian investigation of the RCMP through a truly independent watchdog agency that would report directly to Parliament.
The NDP tried to amend the bill, based on witness testimony, to address these issues, but the Conservatives refused to directly address the issue of sexual harassment and did little to actually modernize the RCMP as it is still hierarchical in nature with no independent civilian oversight. Although this is an approach that the Conservatives have favoured for other areas of public policy, ensuring that complaints are addressed by an impartial third party should be at the heart of any attempt to modernize the complaint procedures for Canada's national police service.
The NDP believes that we can go further to ensure that there is a clear anti-harassment policy in the RCMP, one which would contain specific standards for behaviour and specific criteria for evaluating the performance of all such employees. Such a policy is needed to serve as a basis for a fair discipline process.
I conclude by highlighting the fact that New Democrats made a genuine effort to improve the legislation before us during the committee stage. However, these attempts were rebuffed at every step of the process. New Democrats introduced 18 amendments at committee all designed to ensure heightened transparency to address the specific issues I have mentioned, namely the issue of sexual harassment and the lack of an effective oversight mechanism.
Specifically, NDP members on the public safety committee proposed the following: adding mandatory harassment training for RCMP members specifically to the RCMP Act; ensuring a fully independent civilian review body to investigate complaints against the RCMP; adding a provision to create a national civilian investigative body that would avoid police investigating police, which was ruled inadmissible for some reason; and creating a more balanced human resource policy by removing some of the more stringent powers proposed for the RCMP commissioner and by strengthening the external review committee in cases involving possible dismissal from the force.
However, as has become standard operating procedure, the government side once again took an unreasonable approach to the NDP's proposals, rejecting all 18 amendments, even though they were supported by witness testimony and were a genuine attempt to improve the legislation before us.
New Democrats recognize the deficiency in the approach taken by the Conservative government and its outright rejection of our practical proposals to improve the legislation. We will therefore be unable to support the legislation at this time in the way that it is being presented.