[Rosemary Barton] From the death of George Floyd
an unarmed Black man at the hands of police in the U.S.
has come a major rethink on how policing is done.
In Canada there are cries to defund the police
and instead better fund social services and to use more body cameras.
An idea that gets the prime minister's support.
It is something that is in my opinion what we need to move forward with.
[Rosemary] Brenda Lucki is the Commissioner of the RCMP.
Today we talked about all of that in a one-on-one interview.
Commissioner Lucki, thank you for making the time for us today, appreciate it.
Thank you for having me.
On Monday, Deputy Commissioner for Alberta Curtis Zablocki said he doesn't believe
there's systemic racism in policing in Canada.
Do you agree?
We live in a society where inequalities persist and police are part of that society
so we absolutely have the responsibility to examine the ways in which
we as an organization can do better
and look at races and within our organization.
[Rosemary] I'm not sure you answered the question though.
Do you believe that there is systemic racism
inside police organizations including yours in the country?
That is an interesting question
because in the last couple of days I I have honestly heard about 15 or 20 definitions
of systemic racism and if it refers to an unconscious bias that exists
then we definitely have that in the RCMP.
And we are not immune to it at all in any case.
And there are times when our members don't act in accordance with our core values
which includes racism
and it's those times that we have to make sure that that doesn't happen.
[Rosemary] There are Canadians all over this country who we have heard from before
but we are hearing from much more vocally right now
who do not feel comfortable calling the police.
Who feel scared around the idea of asking the police for help.
They do not feel protected by police.
How do you feel when you hear that?
That completely saddens me.
If you want to know the honest truth
in no way does any police agency including the RCMP
not want to be trusted by the citizens who we serve.
So we need to get better.
This is a big time in our history and it's a big time for police to step up.
And I think the bar is set up really high
but so are my expectations for all employees and in the RCMP.
I need to ask you some specific questions
about incidents that have occurred and gotten come to public attention as of late.
I know that you've seen the pictures of Chief Allen Adam
who says that he was brutally beaten by our RCMP back in March.
What did you think of those pictures when you saw them, commissioner?
Well, nobody likes to see pictures like that.
Obviously that case is under investigation
and if there is actions that are not in line with our core values
and in line with what happened in that incident
those members will be held to account.
I understand it's being investigated
but the RCMP also said that they reviewed the actions of their members in Alberta.
They found them reasonable?
Do you think for anyone to end up looking like that after an intervention with police is reasonable?
There is always a set of circumstances and depending on the circumstances
and the level of resistance sometimes there are intervention actions that need to be taken.
Obviously, we never want to see anybody get hurt
when we're dealing with anybody in any incident.
But it does happen.
Let me ask you about another video where an RCMP officer hit an Indigenous man
who was intoxicated with his vehicle door before arresting him.
What did you think when you saw that video?
And does that seem like a reasonable response to deal with public intoxication.
From the outside looking in I have to be honest it does not look like a reasonable response.
Again we're asked the Ottawa police service to come in
and to investigate that particular incident
and to see what exactly happened in that case.
I know that you removed the chokehold in the 70s under the RCMP.
That you do not use the knee hold that was employed on George Floyd in the United States
and that killed him.
You do however continue to use the carotid hold
which allows an officer to place their arm to make the person --
render them unconscious if needed.
Do you still plan to allow that hold to be used and why so?
That carotid control is at the very end of the continuum
in the most lethal part of our intervention model.
And that is when a member of the public or a member of the police
is faced with grievous or bodily harm.
And it's right at the same location as our firearm would be.
It's when something serious or death or bodily harm is going to happen.
We will definitely review it because I know from what I heard in the media
in the United States they will be reviewing that as well.
You have decided or you have agreed with the prime minister
that body cameras need to be used by some members of the RCMP.
Did you raise the issue of body cameras with the prime minister?
Or did he?
We spoke about just actions to increase transparency.
And of course we are open to anything that provides a greater trust.
A greater accountability, a greater public confidence.
If there is a tool in technology that would do that
then we're obviously open to it.
I have to say though it's it's not the end-all and be-all of accountability and transparency.
A camera is not going to make a person completely accountable.
Where does the funding for these body cameras come from?
Because I would presume you either gonna have to ask for more money from the federal government
or divert money from somewhere else
and I'd be interested to know what where else that money could might come from?
In the RCMP structure, we are contracting our services out to the provinces.
So we have to have discussions with each province and territory
who is responsible for some of that funding.
Depending on what happens we may have to reprioritize some of our strategies
under our digital policing strategy.
And see if we can move money around for that.
But we have to have discussions with the provinces and the territories.
[Rosemary] Because they may have to foot some of the bill, is that the suggestion?
If they're subcontracting you out then they may have to pick up the cost for some of that?
Yeah, it's all in our policing contract
because we have different policing contracts with the provinces and municipalities.
Do you believe that the RCMP has or ever had the trust of racialized communities?
Whether it be black people, people of colour or Indigenous communities in this country.
I would think that there are people within those communities that trust the police.
But I would also say there's probably parts of those communities that don't trust the police.
And that tells me that we need to get better.
I am so determined for us to be the police agency of Canada
that people can look up to and be proud of.
And that they trust our organization.
Does that mean we are going to make mistakes?
Absolutely we're gonna make mistakes
but it's what we do after we make those mistakes
and we need to learn from that
and we need to be better at that.
But do you think, commissioner --
There's a large conversation happening around defunding police forces around the world right now.
Do you still believe that RCMP members are best equipped to deal with mental health crisis.
Substance abuse problems, familial problems, domestic abuse problems?
Are these really the people that should be going into Canadian homes and communities
to deal with these situations?
When we deal with people in a crisis it's not a singular approach.
The RCMP is but one aspect of that approach
and I think we need to work better with our social agencies.
But would you agree to give up funding for your police force
so that more money can be put into social services and help the response that you're talking about?
The funds that we have are the funds that we need to be able to please Canadian public.
But I would say that we need to work better together
and maybe we've had instances in some of our areas
where we've actually embedded mental health professionals within the police
so that they can respond together and use that response.
So that we are better at responding to people in those types of crisis's.
Commissioner, thank you so much for all your time today.
I appreciate it very much.
No, I'm thank you for your respectful questions.