Where are the cops coming from?
That’s the question left answered in the wake of Premier David Eby’s $230 million commitment to fill vacancies in rural RCMP detachments and regional units, as well hiring more officers devoted to major crime, child sex exploitation and money laundering.
Recruitment and retention are major problems facing not just for the RCMP but provincial and city police forces across Canada, a National Police Federation study shows.
The rising public resentment towards people in positions of authority, combined with anti-police sentiment from both sides of the political fence, hardly helps.
Becoming a police officer is not as revered a job as it once was, it seems.
It’s also not something it seems many parents are encouraging their kids to explore as a career option.
I speak from personal experience.
A few years ago, when my teenage daughter was contemplating joining the force, her mother and I were vocally supportive but quietly apprehensive.
When she changed her mind, as teenagers do, and signed up for training to become a Red Seal mechanic instead, we were relieved.
So was our RCMP officer friend.
Doctors, nurses, police officers and other frontline public service professionals are all reporting more and more cases of mental and physical burnout brought on by increasingly challenging working conditions with little to no relief in sight.
Premier Eby will likely be announcing more health care spending soon, promising more facilities, more programs and more personnel.
But where will those health care professionals be coming from?
A glance at the Northern Health careers page shows there are already numerous unfilled nursing and doctor positions in the region.
Without the adequate number of people in place to addresses public safety and health problems at the community level, throwing money in the air from Victoria and hoping it does something somewhere isn’t really a plan at all.
