Lucki’s testimony fails to restore confidence By: Editorial Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Friday, Aug. 26, 2022

Opinion

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This article was published 25/08/2022 (852 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

There are times when an apology is enough; when a sincere expression of contrition for wrongs done is what’s required to allow all involved in a bad situation to move forward.

The appearance this week by RCMP Commissioner Brenda Lucki before Nova Scotia’s Mass Casualty Commission — the public inquiry into the April 2020 shooting spree that lasted 13 hours and resulted in 22 deaths — was most certainly not one of those times.

Ms. Lucki’s testimony before the commission did include an apology, but of a sort that was so long delayed and so vague as to render it essentially meaningless.

“I want to apologize for the RCMP, but in such a way that we weren’t what you expected us to be and I don’t think we were what you wanted us to be or what you needed us to be,” the commissioner said Wednesday at the end of her second day of testimony, in which she was grilled repeatedly by lawyers for the victims’ families about the force’s inadequate response and its seeming inability to incorporate any lessons learned into its current practice.

“I wish that we could have been more and we could have been different and we could have predicted and we could have had more hindsight.”

If that’s the best its top commander can muster in terms of an apology, it’s little wonder Nova Scotia — and for that matter, Canada as a whole — has lost much of its confidence in and respect for the RCMP.

That the mass-murder incident itself — in which a 51-year-old denturist with a documented history of violent behaviour acquired semi-automatic weapons and a replica police vehicle and embarked on a murderous rampage to which the RCMP was clearly ill prepared to react — is an outrage goes without saying.

What’s doubly concerning — insult added to injury, as it were — is Ms. Lucki’s revelation the RCMP has implemented no reforms in the 28 months since the Nova Scotia tragedy, particularly in relation to the egregious failure to warn the public that an active-shooter incident was ongoing.

No RCMP personnel have been disciplined for the force’s action before or during the shooting spree. And when questioned about the lack of institutional reform in its aftermath, the commissioner seemed ill-equipped to offer specifics, stating instead the force is too big (32,000 members) and her executive position too far removed from ground-level concerns for her to provide relevant comment.

“In my role as commissioner, I’m looking at things from the 10,000-foot level,” Ms. Lucki said. “At my level, I don’t get into the weeds on many of these questions.”

It’s hard to imagine the top Mountie’s appearance before the commission being any less satisfactory. Detached, obtuse and bordering on evasive by dint of its lack of specificity, Ms. Lucki’s testimony likely did nothing to allay the concerns of Nova Scotians whose communities continue to depend on RCMP service — policing the commissioner maintains still ranks “second to none.”

On Tuesday, the first day of her testimony, Ms. Lucki continued to dismiss ongoing concerns regarding political interference in the Nova Scotia investigation, specifically related to pressure she exerted for the release of details about the weapons used by the killer — which some assert was in an effort to underpin the federal government’s gun-control agenda.

The commissioner said the issue has been politicized, is not “as big as you’re making it out to be,” and has become a source of personal frustration.

On the last count, at least, Ms. Lucki finds herself on common ground with those who have followed this sad story for the past 28 months.