REFORM POLICE-GOVERNMENT RELATIONS – IPPERWASH INQUIRY

The Ipperwash Inquiry has recommended a broader power for the government to direct certain police operations. To this extent, Judge Sidney B. Linden, the Inquiry Commissioner, parted company with the traditional position that government should keep its hands off police operations. But he fell short of recommending the much wider power urged by the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. He also failed to adopt the CCLA proposal for an independent audit system.

The inquiry was created to review the circumstances and policies surrounding the killing of Aboriginal leader Dudley George by the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) when they attempted to end an Aboriginal occupation of Ipperwash Park in September of 1995. For years, the government of Ontario denied any involvement in the OPP action. Indeed, cabinet ministers argued that they should not even have had a right to know of the OPP plan before it was executed. CCLA challenged this notion arguing that it undermines government accountability for the police.