Ottawa police introduce new policies following scathing gender audit

The Ottawa Police Service has changed two of its hiring policies following a scathing independent audit issued last November into gender inequality on the force.

All internal interviews for promotions now must have at least one woman on the hiring panel, and employees on parental leave can now apply for posted jobs neither of which was the case before.

The new policies were revealed Tuesday as part an update provided to the human resources committee of the Ottawa Police Services board.

"We have 200 years of existence, of developing a profession of which 177 years have been with nothing but men. So we need to identify [how to]recognize the experience of women," OPS Deputy Chief Steve Bell said after the meeting.

"It's 2017. We need to be more progressive. We need to be more forward looking."

Human rights commission ordered audit

The new policies come out of last year's audit, whichwas ordered in 2015 by the Ontario Human Rights Commission as part of a settlement between OPSand one of its officers.

That officer, Barbara Sjaarda,had alleged she was denied training and promotions because of "her family status, sex and maternity leaves."

• Women still struggling to get ahead on Ottawa police force, damning audit finds

Among the audit's findings were that women on the police force are underrepresented when it comes to getting promotions, aren't given an equal voice when it comes to decision-making, and have been subjected to "inappropriate behaviour or comments aimed at their gender."

It alsofound that 23 per centof sworn officers with the police serviceare women a rate that's slightly higher thanthe national average of roughly20 per cent, but which has only grown marginally in the past 10 years.

'Seems pretty straightforward'

In addition to the new hiring procedures, the police service is also creating an "Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Office" to ensure new policies are meeting those three standards, Bell said.

Before the audit was ordered, the police force didn't realize that employees on parental leave couldn't apply for new positions, Bell said,something he called "an error on our part."

"It seems pretty straightforward, doesn't it? But that says we've gone through the exercise of looking at all the things we do around gender," hetold CBC Radio'sAll In A Day.

"I think it's a legacy piece. And I think it's a legacy piece that we've thankfully identified and been able to change pretty quickly."

As of Monday, officers are now also being trained on"bias-free interviewing techniques" as the force begins to promote officers to the rank of staff sergeant, Bell added.

Female officers likely to be single, childless

As well as the policy changes, Tuesday's update to the police services board committee also included the results of a survey that showed female sworn OPS officers are more likely to be single, childless and hold the rank of constable than their male counterparts.

Female officers are also more likely to have spent 20 or more years in their current rank, the survey results showed.

Bell said those findings werean "aha moment" for the force, one that helped explain why more women weren't in the force's senior ranks.

"Women by percentage get promoted at the same [rate] as men. Not as many are entering the promotional process because they don't think that they have the skills or the background or enough experience," Bell told All In A Day.

"So we have to start making sure they're transferring to the right positions to get them that experience base ... Men will jump into the process as soon as they can. Women are waiting until they feel they're absolutely ready."

The force willinterview roughly one-third of the more than 600 people who responded to the survey, he added, to find why they feel that way.