The Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM) is struggling to retain its troops. Last January, the Brotherhood of Policemen and Policewomen sounded the alarm. There were 218 departures in 2022: 144 retirements and 74 resignations. Unheard of according to the president of the union, Yves Francœur.
As he marks his first 100 days as director, Fady Dagher has made recruiting and retaining new police officers one of his top three priorities, and rightly so. He also wants to prevent acts of violence involving firearms – the two most recent murders have raised the concern of Montrealers a notch – and to get closer to the people of Montreal. But to get there, it needs manpower.
SPVM police officers complain about the cost of housing in the city, the lack of parking and the constant media attention on their work. They also find the ground very “hot” in Montreal. Let’s say that there is no rushing to the gate to wear the SPVM uniform despite the “metropolitan bonus” of almost 8%.
The chief of police therefore undertook a “great seduction” operation to attract young people. Last February, rookie pay was cut from $36,900 to $46,100. To this increase will apply the new collective agreement, approved by the majority of the police last week, which provides for a new salary increase of 20% over five years.
The SPVM thus becomes one of the most attractive police services in Quebec.
This employment contract also provides for more positions with schedules that promote work-family balance, a request from the police, said Chief Dagher, who creates 650 positions with day or evening schedules. Recruits will also be entitled to a weekend off every 35 days.
Fady Dagher is also introducing a four-week socio-community immersion for recruits. These internships, which have become his trademark, have been very successful in Longueuil.
But Montreal is not Longueuil. Will these four short weeks be enough to arouse an attachment among the new police officers? So that a “Montreal click” occurs?
And above all, is it only Montreal the problem? Recruitment issues are everywhere in Quebec as well as in the rest of Canada.
To remedy this, the Ontario government has just announced that it will assume the cost of training its future police officers. Price of this commitment: 20 million dollars. The requirements are also lowered by exempting future police officers from post-secondary studies. It is thus hoped to increase the number of agents on the ground.
American police forces face a similar situation.
A June 2021 survey by the Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) of 200 police departments in the United States observed that police morale had plummeted and retirements and resignations had soared.
A trend is confirmed year after year: police work as a whole attracts young people less.
The fact of working under the scrutiny of the public and the media, who dissect their work and point out their biases and prejudices, is disturbing if we trust the PERF study, which conducted a series of interviews with police officers who resigned or retired early.
The other problem facing police forces is the arrival on the job market of Generation Z. Several studies have looked at this generational change. We note that young people do not appreciate the military hierarchy of the police, the obligation to obey orders. Apprentice police officers born after 1997 want to participate more in decision-making and seek, more than their elders, it seems, meaning in their work. It will therefore take more than a bonus and flexible working hours to attract them.
The measures announced by Chief Fady Dagher to seduce recruits are not bad. But the reflection will have to be deeper to convince young people that there is a future in the police.