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Section II: Aanlysis of Program Activities by Strategic Outcome(s)

Strategic Outcome

RCMP members are held publicly accountable for their conduct in the performance of their duties.

The CPC is an independent federal agency established in 1988 to receive and review public complaints about the conduct of RCMP members in a fair and impartial manner. The CPC strives to achieve the above Strategic Outcome with a single program activity, civilian review of RCMP members' conduct in the performance of their duties.

The CPC holds the RCMP accountable to the public by providing, at the request of complainants, an independent review of the RCMP's disposition of complaints and by making recommendations to the RCMP Commissioner. Much of the Commission's work continues to centre on providing direct service to Canadians concerned about the actions of the RCMP. The CPC's national intake office in Surrey, British Columbia, continues to experience increasing workload. Specifically, it processed over 9,000 client contacts in 2008-2009, which included correspondences, faxes, formal complaints against the RCMP, alternative dispute resolutions, and general enquiries.

The CPC responds to the needs of the public by providing a number of options for the processing of any concerns. A member of the public contacting the CPC will normally be provided with same-day access to an experienced analyst who will listen to their concerns, assess what they would like to achieve and identify an appropriate process that will meet their objectives.

When reviewing a complaint, the CPC does not act as an advocate either for the complainant or for RCMP members. Rather, its role is to conduct an independent inquiry and reach objective conclusions based on the information available. In conducting its review, the CPC considers all relevant information provided by the complainant and the RCMP.

The Chair also has the authority to hold a public interest hearing to inquire into a complaint. The ability to self-initiate such a review allows the CPC to broaden its scope of review beyond what may have been articulated by individual complainants, leading to the identification of systemic issues that may not otherwise be adequately explored. The Chair reports his findings and any recommendations for action stemming from a Chair-initiated complaint to the Commissioner of the RCMP and to the Minister of Public Safety.

If the Chair is not satisfied with the RCMP's handling of a complaint, the CPC will issue an interim report of its findings and recommendations; after the RCMP Commissioner replies to this interim report, a final report is forwarded to the Minister of Public Safety, to the RCMP Commissioner and to all parties. Alternatively, if the Chair concludes that the RCMP responded adequately to the complainant's concerns, a final report is delivered stating that the RCMP's handling of the complaint was satisfactory.

Program Activity by Strategic Outcome


Program Activity: Civilian review of RCMP members' conduct in the performance of their duties
2008-09 Financial Resources ($ millions) 2008-09 Human Resources (FTEs)
Planned Spending Total Authorities Actual Spending Planned Actual Difference
8,676 9,223 8,569 44 56 12



Expected
Results
Performance
Indicators
Targets Performance
Status
Performance
Summary
Access to and openness of the public complaints process is improved.  The percentage of complaints received from the public directly by the CPC is increased. Annual increase of 5% Exceeded  Approximately 67% of all complaints, versus less than 50% in prior years, are now lodged with the CPC.

The RCMP has agreed that that the CPC will promptly receive all complaints lodged with the RCMP.

Strengthen the complaint and review processes. Complaints received are processed and delivered within 4 days and reviews are completed within 120 days. 80% of complaints processed within 4 days

80% of interim and satisfied reports completed within 120 days of request

80% of Final after Commissioner's Notice (FACN) completed within 30 days

Met 90% of complaints processed within 4 days

89% of interim and satisfied reports completed within 12 days of request

95% of Final after Commissioner's Notice (FACN) completed within 30 days

Undertake strategic policy analysis and produce research-based analysis to improve the relevance of review recommendations and to identify continuing, emerging and new complaint trends The number of policy and research reports produced. Two policy and four research reports produced for internal and external audiences Exceeded

 

5 Research and 5 Policy reports produced
Key public reports produced:
  • Final report for the Minister of Public Safety on CEWs
  • Analysis of the RCMP's CEW use for the calendar year 2008
  • Review of the RCMP's Public Complaint Records – 2007

Benefits for Canadians

Safe and secure communities is a defining characteristic of the Canadian way of life and Canadians are rightly proud of that tradition of community safety and security. Canadians deserve to live in a just society, to have faith in their justice system, and to be protected against violence and criminal acts.

The CPC provides civilian oversight of RCMP members' conduct in performing their policing duties so as to hold the RCMP accountable to the public. Its job is to help find and shape a balance between individual rights and collective security.

The Commission makes a significant contribution to protecting citizens by building safer and healthier communities and its work is an essential component of the government's commitment to strengthen the security of Canadians. Canadians must have confidence in their national law enforcement agencies. The CPC's oversight ensures that this confidence, faith and trust is well-placed.

Performance Analysis

This year, the CPC made significant progress toward achieving its strategic outcome of holding RCMP members accountable for their conduct in the performance of their duties. The CPC aims to have the entire complaint process — from the initial lodging of the complaint to the final disposition on review — finalized within one year. The CPC is seeing a number of complaints being completed within the one year time period, which is a significant improvement from previous years.

With additional funding, the CPC maintained rigorous service standards affecting the entire complaint and review process and, despite a significant increase of 34.5% in the number of complaints received, it achieved its performance targets.

When a person lodges a formal complaint about the conduct of a member of the RCMP, if that person is not satisfied with the RCMP's response, that person has the right to request that the CPC independently review the propriety of the conduct and the RCMP's handling of the matter.

In 2008-2009 the CPC was asked to formally review the RCMP's handling of 226 complaints. Of these, 78% were from complaints originally lodged with the CPC. The CPC notes that the complex nature of the issues raised in these review requests is continuing to increase.

As part of its ongoing commitment to ensuring straightforward, public access to reports and recommendations given to the RCMP, the CPC greatly expanded the amount of information available on its website this past year. Additionally, in an effort to promote civilian confidence in the RCMP, one section of the website features a number of reports which highlight both opportunities for improvement as well as instances of exemplary police conduct.

While addressing cases involving the conduct of individual RCMP members, it has also aggressively sought to identify systemic problems that frequently are catalysts for complaints about individual member's conduct. The additional funding received in 2008-2009 also allowed the CPC to continue to focus on Chair-initiated complaints and public interest investigations in relation to those issues of particular concern to the public, i.e. deaths in RCMP custody and the use of the CEW. By doing so, the CPC is creating a comprehensive factual picture of police activities and enabling the CPC to examine RCMP practices on a detachment, divisional and national basis.

This approach also allows the CPC to better inform the RCMP Commissioner, the Minister and the Canadian public of the true nature and scope of problems that have tended to be viewed as isolated events. To foster greater public debate on these important issues, the CPC continued to publish on its website all reports containing its adverse significant findings and its recommendations to address these findings.

The CPC observed a marked increase in the number of findings and recommendations that the Commissioner of the RCMP agreed with. Of the number of adverse findings made, the Commissioner agreed with 75% of them. Furthermore, he accepted 85% of the CPC's recommendations.

The Review of the Record Project, a unique project which was launched in 2007, released its first report in January of 2009. The project examined all RCMP complaint dispositions-not merely those where a complainant had requested a review by the CPC going back to January 1, 2007. The main goal is to identify opportunities to strengthen police accountability and effect change within the entire complaint system. By tracking all active public complaint files, whether originally lodged with the RCMP or the CPC, the project is uniquely positioned to understand why complainants are complaining, what they are complaining about and how the RCMP is performing.

A credible and effective RCMP civilian oversight function demands that all members of the public feel entitled, empowered and able to file a complaint when appropriate. But analysis has found that the concerns of vulnerable populations tend to be under-represented for cultural, linguistic or literacy-related reasons and that members of Aboriginal communities are reluctant to avail themselves of the public complaints machinery. Key stakeholder organizations have embraced our efforts to help increase awareness of the CPC's role as an independent civilian body which can review complaints about the conduct of RCMP members.

In order to enhance our outreach efforts across the board, the CPC produced a short in-house video to explain the work of the CPC and the processes involved in filing a complaint. Versions of the video will be made available in multiple languages.

In its continuing quest for workplace excellence, the CPC developed a framework for a workplace of choice and finalized a CPC-wide code of conduct suitable for a quasi-judicial body, which has been distributed and embraced by all staff. The CPC is starting to see progress from this focus, the results from the recently published Public Service-wide Employee Survey indicate that Employee Engagement is much higher than average at the CPC than for the Public Service as a whole.

Lessons Learned

The CPC is starting to see the results of the integration of complaints and reviews into a single operational unit. With access to additional financial resources the CPC was able to handle a 34.5% increase in the number of complaints received and meet its service standards.

The CPC believes that the synergies realized as a result of this reorganization have contributed to the CPC being more attuned to the needs of the Canadian public and thus better able to identify and respond to emerging trends related to police oversight.

A key component of having an effective public complaints process is making sure citizens are made aware of the process and their rights therein. The CPC's national outreach capability is subject to limited resources and gaps in human resources. And although notable progress has been made in the past year with key stakeholder organizations it has become clear that a more sustained effort is required in order to build trust and understanding of the CPC's role as an independent civilian body which can review complaints about the conduct of RCMP members.

The CPC recognizes that not every concern has a basis in conduct, nor is the formal complaint process the singular vehicle to address issues raised by the public. It acts on the need to provide additional service to the public by recognizing that many of the issues raised by citizens could suitably and promptly be addressed by experienced analysts. This may include requests for information about police authority, obtaining assistance in furthering an investigation or gaining an understanding of the role of Crown counsel. This alternative measure appreciably decreases the demands placed on the complaint system.

In recognition of the need to provide a uniform quality of civilian oversight of police in the contracting provinces, the CPC in March 2008 hosted a meeting of civilian police oversight bodies to discuss a broad range of operational and strategic matters. Future meetings will be held with a view to identifying opportunities for enhanced collaboration between the CPC and its provincial counterparts.

Since 2005 2006, one of the CPC's priorities has been to create a workplace of choice for its employees. One of the tools that both assists the CPC in measuring progress made towards the priority and planning activities to improve the workplace culture is an annual staff survey and all-staff meeting. The annual staff survey is based on the Public Service-wide Survey and is undertaken by a consultant from Public Works and Government Service Canada Government Consulting.

The CPC completed its fourth annual survey in November 2008. Indicators of Workplace Wellbeing are used to identify areas of key strengths and key weaknesses. Results from the survey are fed back to staff in advance of the annual all-staff meeting and time is set aside to discuss both areas of concern and areas of improvements. The discussion is led by an independent facilitator with the goal of validating the results of the survey, identifying no more than three top issues for follow-up and developing an employee-led action plan. Issues identified for follow-up included promoting workplace well-being through continued efforts on respect in the workplace, values and ethics, the Pride and Recognition program, and harmonious labour relations and building on the strength of the CPC's commitment to learning and career development. Senior management has committed to the follow-up actions and to reporting progress made at quarterly meetings.

Overall, the CPC has seen a steady improvement in the number of indicators of Workplace Wellbeing receiving a positive score. In fact, the results from the Public Service-wide Employee Survey indicated that Employee Engagement was much higher than average at the CPC than for the Public Service as a whole. By setting priorities based on survey results and monitoring progress the CPC has been able to make significant progress towards its priority of becoming a workplace of choice. The CPC is pleased to see that the Government will be moving to an annual Public Service-wide survey.