An RCMP officer wears a body camera at the detachment in Bible Hill, N.S. on Sunday, April 18, 2021. The RCMP will begin its rollout of body-worn cameras for RCMP officers across the country next week. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan

OTTAWA - The RCMP is rolling out body-worn cameras for officers, deploying more than 10,000 cameras across the country in the next 12 to 18 months.

Officers will be expected to turn on their cameras when they answer calls or interact with the public. They will wear the cameras on their chests and they will flash red lights to indicate they are recording.

"The muscle memory that we're training officers to build in is essentially seatbelt off, camera on," said Taunya Goguen, the RCMP’s corporate management officer, at a press briefing Thursday.

The RCMP began field-testing cameras last year and the national rollout will begin on Nov. 18.

The RCMP says the cameras serve as an objective record of how officers interact with the community.

Goguen said the force expects the cameras to lead to "greater accountability and public trust, better interactions between the police and the public, improved evidence-gathering and quick resolution to public complaints."

The cameras won’t be worn for surveillance or for 24-hour recordings, or used in settings with a high expectation of privacy, such as washrooms or hospitals. They also won’t record during strip or body cavity searches, according to the RCMP.

Trenton Entwistle, the program manager for the camera program, said video from the cameras won’t be used for facial recognition "at any time."

The videos can’t be edited, and officers can’t delete their own videos. The length of time each video is retained will vary from 30 days to more than two years, depending on the type of incident, the RCMP outlined.

The Liberal government has allocated $238.5 million over six years and $50 million in ongoing funding for the cameras.

It first pledged the money in 2020, following the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer, which set off mass demonstrations against systemic racism and police brutality across the U.S.

Goguen noted the program came "in response to concerns raised by racialized communities and (is) meant to address systemic racism."

She said the initiative "will be important for the police and communities to increase transparency, providing information about what occurs during those interactions."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 14, 2024.

News from © The Canadian Press, 2024