Montreal police have launched a hiring drive for members of ethnic minorities in an attempt to redress the problem of minority under representation.
Currently only between four and eight percent of the 5,000 strong force are members of visible minorities and that total should be somewhere at least around 10 percent.
“To be credible or have respect for the population I think we need to represent them and represent them in their full diversity,” said Montreal police representative Laurent Gingras.
The present ratio in the police force does not reflect Montreal's ethnic makeup, said Fo Niemi, the executive director of the Centre for Research-Action on Race Relations.
Niemi explained that the mandatory swim test to become a police officer is a problem for communities that do not have access to pools.
"Some groups fail swim tests more than others," said Niemi, "so I think it's something we have to look at in terms of removing obstacles to fair employment opportunities."
Egbert Gaye, who runs a Montreal newspaper catering to African-Canadian issues called Montreal Community Contact, notes that while hiring more visible minorities is a positive step, it won’t necessarily eradicate some of the prejudices endemic to some members of the squad.
“The problem with hiring a lot of visible minorities and putting them in that culture of ignorance and distrust is that they too assume the behaviour of the culture, they take on those faulty perceptions. You’ve got to work on educating those front line officers, let them known that black people are normal Montrealers and they can own whatever car they want and they are not all criminals,” said Gaye..
