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Annual Report 2007 - Raising the Bar
Introductory message from the chair
It is an honour to introduce the 2007 Annual Report of the Military Police Complaints Commission (MPCC). In so doing, it is my privilege to reflect upon the hard work of the Commission's small, but extremely dedicated staff, without which there would be very little to report. Moreover, I would be remiss not to recognize at the outset the equally important positive and constructive responses of the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal (CFPM) to the Commission's recommendations, without which our work would have little impact.
A major focus of the Commission's last Annual Report was the organizational change and capacity building within the MPCC in order to meet the challenges of an increasing caseload and to better address the expectations of stakeholders. This report will highlight the fruits of those efforts in terms of “raising the bar
” for the delivery of military police services and the accountability of the leadership of the military police and the Canadian Forces for provision of policing services which meet the highest Canadian standards.
As will be seen in the caseload statistics included in this report, the Commission issued almost twice as many reports in 2007 than it did in the previous year. At the same time, the trend continues towards consolidating findings and recommendations resulting in, on average, fewer per case. This is in keeping with the Commission's philosophy that the best practice for independent civilian oversight of the police is to concentrate principally on substantive systemic issues that are very often the root cause of individual instances of below standard performance. By way of example in that regard, the report of the Commission's first public hearing, held in respect of the investigation of a youth for sexual assault, contained significant recommendations concerning operational procedures, training standards and supervisory practices that far outweighed those findings related to the specific conduct of the directly involved military police personnel. It is believed that this approach to oversight will have the most positive and effective benefit to the system as a whole in the shortest possible time.
Some of the operational challenges faced by the MPCC during 2007 mirrored those faced by the Canadian Forces, with the conduct of operations in Afghanistan as the common cause. On a micro level, such challenges related to the carrying out of investigations involving members of the military community whose increasingly turbulent lives have made them difficult to locate in a timely fashion and in circumstances conducive to an interview.
Of far greater import was the issue of the Commission's jurisdiction in respect of the conduct of military police personnel, and potentially others in respect of interference with the military police, engaged in military operations overseas, which was squarely presented in February of 2007 with the receipt of two complaints related to the treatment of detainees in Afghanistan. Despite the genesis of the MPCC in the aftermath and related to events in Somalia and the Commission having previously dealt with cases arising both in Bosnia and Afghanistan, these most recent complaints have caused the jurisdictional issue to be briefly raised by Canadian Forces authorities. The pertinent question was and is: if not the Commission enquiring into these important matters for which it was designed and on behalf of the Government and people of Canada, then whom? The Commission is grateful to the Defence Minister of the day for clarifying this issue in support of the MPCC. Nonetheless, while these most challenging enquiries are advancing, their success remains entirely dependent on the increased cooperation of not just the Department of National Defence but other involved Departments as well. It is hoped that such cooperation will be forthcoming and that the Commission will be able to report its findings in the next year.
Such questioning of mandate makes necessary the observation that 2007 saw ever increasing public attention in Canada generally to matters of police oversight and mounting interest in the models for such oversight being made more effective. Moreover, the late Brian Dickson, former Chief Justice of Canada, in his 1998 report on the Military Justice System, said to the effect that police oversight is equally important in the military context as in the civil sector, if not more so. With those thoughts in mind and noting that the next five-year review of the National Defence Act is upcoming, the Commission is prepared to assist efforts, in anyway possible, to ensure the model for oversight in Canada's military community evolves in a fashion consistent with public expectations.
On a final note, a continuing theme heard during each of the eight Base visits conducted by the Commission during the last year, as well as during many of its enquiries, is most worthy of mention. It involved concerns about shortages of military police personnel to the point that one or two MPs are commonly on duty where previously there were three to five. Often times reservists, who are not fully trained or credentialed and are subject to different professional standards and oversight, and/or recent Academy graduates, still in the training cycle, are included in those reduced numbers. In the words of one veteran Master Warrant Officer, the personnel shortages represent “a disaster waiting to happen
”.
These manpower level concerns were compounded by others related to the competition between various Commands for MP resources to service their own particular needs, a situation perceived to be to the prejudice of more centralized and professional control of policing resources by the CFPM. I hope that Canadian Forces authorities will study these genuinely expressed concerns and take any appropriate action to prevent this prediction from becoming a reality, all in the interests of ensuring the highest standards of policing in the military context, at home and abroad, as well as being to the benefit of the dedicated men and women who serve in the military police.
Peter A. Tinsley
Chair
December 2007
