Sexual assault incidents in Ontario

The #MeToo movement has come to Canada, with new allegations in politics building on already active issues in institutions like the military. It has spurred a response in the media and has even led to new federal legislation. And governments are looking to increase awareness of the subject and address the issue: Ontario has an active plan to combat sexual assault and harassment. While the topic has grown in prominence in the mainstream, Statistics Canada data shows that on the whole, the rate of sexual assault (assault with a sexual objective or nature) is declining throughout the province of Ontario — but so is the rate at which these incidents are cleared formally by police.

Change in the rate of sexual assault incidents reported and percentage of incidents cleared by year

The rate of sexual assault incidents in Ontario is decreasing — though at varying rates each year. But clearance rates are also down, indicating that police are laying fewer charges or otherwise resolving matters when they receive information about an incident.

Source: Statistics Canada, Table 252-0077, “Incident-based crime statistics, by detailed violations and police services, Ontario.”

Sexual assault incidents by police service

Police services are on the front lines of dealing with sexual assault in Ontario. Police remain the go-to institution when criminal assault takes place, as the Ontario Human Rights Commission recommends. But the different police services of the eight biggest cities in Ontario have varied records of addressing the problem. Many, including the Toronto Police Service, have guidelines for both frontline officers and survivors. Hamilton’s guidelines, for example, mirror Toronto’s. But the two cities have widely varying rates of both incidents of sexual assault and clearance. Rates vary greatly in the other six major Ontarian cities as well.

Sexual assault statistics for major Ontario cities, 2016

Incidents of sexual assault in the eight biggest cities in Ontario make up almost half on the entire incidents in the province. But within the cities, rates vary greatly, with Hamilton holding the highest rate of assault and lowest rate of clearance.

Source: Statistics Canada, Table 252-0077, “Incident-based crime statistics, by detailed violations and police services, Ontario.”

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Data Visualization Explanation

Though formally approved, the project to expand the Trans Mountain pipeline remains one of the most controversial issues in the country. Opposed by some First Nations, municipal councils, environmentalist groups and the government of British Columbia, the project has become a focal point in the wider campaign against pipeline construction.

Yet the original Trans Mountain pipeline, which the current project seeks to complement, faced few of these roadblocks and little public opposition.

In fact, the first pipeline was seen as an important and positive development throughout Canada, according to an analysis of primary documents and the testimony of experts. The speed with which the project proceeded is a good first indicator: Trans Mountain was proposed in 1951 and construction wrapped up a mere two years later in 1953.

By contrast, the extension project was first proposed in 2013 and approved by the federal government in 2016, yet remains years from completion. It may face lengthy court challenges and intense on-the-ground protests in B.C. — likely encouraged by the provincial government.

In a 1952 speech reported by The Coast News, a paper serving the British Columbian coast, then-B.C. premier Boss Johnson conveyed a very different attitude. The Trans Mountain Pipe Line was “perhaps the biggest thing that has happened to the lower mainland,” he said.

A major project at the time, Trans Mountain was the second in a wave of long-distance pipelines spurred by the 1947 discovery of the massive Leduc oil reserves in Alberta. It was the first pipeline across the Rockies.

Economic considerations were front and centre for the original project. Globe and Mail articles from the time emphasized the substantial investment made in local communities, the importance of the increase in pumping capacity, and the rapid pace of construction.

In the same 1952 speech, Premier Johnson noted proudly that the $82 million being spent on the pipeline would be a boon to B.C.’s economy. That’s approximately $765 million in today’s dollars, according to a Bank of Canada inflation calculator. The price tag for the extension project currently sits at about $7.4 billion.

Despite the ballooning cost, the impetus behind today’s extension is also economic. Another pipeline to the Pacific, its proponents say, would allow Canada economic access to growing Asian market, especially China.

In 1952, when construction began on Trans Mountain, Canadian troops were fighting Chinese soldiers in Korea. And in the midst of the Cold War, the Trans Mountain Pipe Line was seen as an important security project. Canadian officials were concerned that oil tankers serving the Lower Mainland would be vulnerable to submarine attack, according to Robert D. Bott, an oil historian and journalist.

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the original pipeline’s approval and construction was the lack of significant or effective opposition. According to Clint Tippett, president of the Petroleum History Society, issues like First Nations Rights, climate change and even  the attitude of not-in-my-backyard-ism — all in the forefront of today’s process — were of limited importance.

It is unfathomable today, for example, that the federal government would amend the National Parks Act to allow pipelines in nature reserves, as the Liberals of 1950 did to allow Trans Mountain to cross Jasper National Park.

Parliamentary debate focused largely on the specifics of the plan (the amount that should run through Canada and the cost) not the question of its importance. On the whole, MPs treated the project as an obviously beneficial endeavour.

When faced with the difficult reality of contemporary pipeline politics, the original Trans Mountain process must seem for proponents of today’s extension a distant, happy dream.

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Documentation Commentary

The Ottawa Police Service is struggling to contain volatile overtime costs that are putting it under enormous financial pressure, an analysis of their 2018 budget reveals.

The $2.1 million increase in 2018 represents a change of over 25 per cent compared to last year and makes up almost a quarter of the overall budget increase for the police department. To stay financially sound, the department has had to defer contributions to its capital funds, relying instead on debt to finance those projects.

According to their own forecasts, the police logged a $3.1 deficit through overtime costs alone in 2017.

The troubles are specific to the police department: neither the paramedic nor fire services have experienced similar difficulties with their overtime costs in recent years.

The Police Services Board, the civilian body that oversees the force, is well aware of the issue. Chair Eli El-Chantiry said in an email — he could not be reached in person or over the phone — that “there will always be a need for overtime in policing.” The budget increase, he said, is meant to “better reflect actual expenditures.”

According to a statement from the finance section of the Ottawa Police Services, who also did not give an in-person or phone interview, much of the increase in costs comes from how overtime is actually logged. Prior to 2015, costs in the form of lieu time were not counted in overtime.

Matt Skof, president of Ottawa’s police union, said the use of lieu time should never have existed as it was not governed by the collective agreement between the union and the service.

The police’s finance section also said that the “drastic changes” to the overtime budgets of some sections within the force were better reflections of the actual situation. The communications, 911 and switchboard team, for example, has had over $527,000 added to their budget, an increase of 542% over last year. Frontline services, meanwhile, have seen their overtime budget bumped by $586,000, a 93% increase.

Matt Skof said that overtime costs have hit the communications centre and the frontline forces particularly hard because they both have minimum staffing levels that must be met. Even so, he said, the use of overtime to fill those gaps was unsustainable.

“We’ll inevitably, eventually, have to grieve the treatment of the members there because they are relying on overtime for their baseline of staffing and that’s not acceptable,” Skof said.

“Not to mention it’s fiscally irresponsible,” he added.

Too much overtime staffing increases fatigue in the force, making the lives of individual officers more difficult and increasing burnout rates, Skof said. And using overtime to make up for staffing shortages only increases those problems.

“You’re chasing your tail, trying to keep up.”

Still, Skof thinks that the increase in overtime budgets is the right move. He agreed with the city’s assessment that the budget is a “more accurate reflection of the experience over prior years.” But, he said, it doesn’t do anything to address the underlying issue of lack of staffing.

“Theoretically, if they had an appropriately staffed organization, they wouldn’t have the same need to have the budget for overtime,” Skof said.

In his statement, Eli El-Chantiry pointed to two things the police and city are doing to cut overtime costs: automating the tracking of how overtime is used and adding more officers. According to El-Chantiry, the force will complete its plan to hire 75 new officers in 2018, and is expecting to hire 30 more per year in the next three years.