Instead of striving to recruit the best candidates, the force favours the governing coalition’s obsession with diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI).
Its hiring strategy is akin to that of a school board in Toronto or Vancouver. As many of us are aware, the education sector is the most afflicted by social experiments. This holds true for schools, colleges, and universities. And when a schoolteacher leads a government, the outcome shouldn’t surprise us.
“The RCMP is looking to increase diversity amongst applicants and cadets by modernizing its screening tools to promote diversity and ensure candidates have the characteristics and attributes for future police workforce needs. This includes screening for bias, racism and discriminatory attitudes and beliefs. We will also increase diversity amongst proactive recruiters, to better represent the diversity we seek to attract.”
The same DEI virus has made its way into the federal bureaucracy and organizations such as the courts and the Armed Forces. These are the folks receiving tampons in men’s toilets within federal buildings.
The RCMP’s missteps are many.
Ten years ago, the credibility of the force took a considerable blow after their destructive expedition following the flooding in High River, Alberta, where officers entered homes to seize firearms. Moving closer to the present, the disarray following the September 2022 attacks on the James Smith Cree Nation and in Weldon, Saskatchewan, left everyone questioning the competence of the RCMP. A gruesome ordeal that cost 11 lives and left 18 severely injured drew attention to the ill-preparedness of the force.
Worse still, the Nova Scotia massacre, which occurred two years prior to this, was another reminder of the inadequacies within the force. The subsequent inquiry revealed a force bereft of leadership and willing to put itself in the political service of the current government. The absence of a federal task force to address the ongoing menace of country-wide attacks on over 100 churches in the past two years shows signs of political meddling.
It is these and other blunders, and the surrender to external political agendas divorced from policing, that have affected RCMP morale and the public perception of the Mounties.
The shortage of new blood with an accompanying personnel hemorrhaging are adding to a demoralized workforce.
Something else is going on. The RCMP might find solutions to its troubles if it finds leadership interested in excellence in policing.
How does the RCMP plan to boost its female recruit target to 30 percent by 2025 when males identifying as women compete in the same recruitment category? How does this tactic contribute to improving the low morale among staff? The irony here is that the RCMP has grappled for decades to improve its treatment of women officers. Sadly, adopting a policy to replace women with men who identify as women achieves the opposite. Moreover, the gap in honesty and integrity Canadians perceive won’t be narrowed through the unscientific ideological falsehood that men can be women.
The RCMP’s social experiments are producing the opposite of what they state. The force needs to be liberated from the clutches of careerist bureaucrats exclusively interested in their political advancement. It should concentrate on encouraging capable officers to focus on key policing competencies.
It is crucial that leaders return to the RCMP’s original purpose and high-standing policing. To do any less is a betrayal of its mandate and proud tradition.
