Wally Oppal receives his honorary doctorate (image credit - CFJC Today)

By Michael Reeve

WALLY OPPAL

Former B.C. attorney general Oppal touts provincial police force

Jun 10, 2022 | 3:54 PM

KAMLOOPS — Convocation at Thompson Rivers University (TRU) finished up on Friday (June 10) with the 2022 Faculties of Law and Art receiving their degrees. The TRU law school honoured a former school chancellor at their ceremony in the Honourable Wally Oppal.

Throughout his storied career, Oppal served as a lawyer, before being appointed as a judge, advancing to the Supreme and appeal courts of British Columbia, all that before serving in the legislature as an MLA and attorney general.

It’s not Oppal’s first honorary degree, but again and again throughout his speech Friday morning, he referenced how special it was to receive one from a school where he served as chancellor for more than half a decade.

“It’s huge. I have been affiliated here at TRU since 2010 — I became the chancellor at that time. It’s a huge honour for me to be recognized by the university,” said Oppal.

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In 2010, Oppal was commissioned to conduct an inquiry into the Robert Pickton murders. He investigated what went wrong in the police force to allow one of Canada’s deadliest serial killers to roam free for so long. Experiences like that make Oppal uniquely qualified to comment on a potential provincial police force.

“This is a question of governance. The RCMP are controlled from Ottawa. The province needs a police force that is governed locally. That is the weakness of the RCMP — while they do an excellent job in investigations, the fact is there has to be a police force that is accountable to local needs and is governed locally and is run locally,” said Oppal.

Some of the support behind a provincial police force versus the RCMP is the idea starting clean. Oppal agreed that the RCMP has made mistakes but noted the job has changed but a switch to the provincial force won’t work without proper funding.

“Since we expect the police to do jobs that they are not really qualified to do, mental illness, homelessness, poverty and all those things. I think it might be a good idea to start fresh. But, we have to equip those people, we have to put funding in, and we have to help the policing forces that come to us in the future,” added Oppal.

Moving to a provincial police force will undoubtedly cost British Colombians more, how much is still unknown.

“Are we not prepared to pay more for public safety? Public safety that is local in nature. I’m sure it will cost more but I think the public of British Columbia holds the policing in high esteem, the justice system in high esteem. Sometimes is cost more to do these things,” said Oppal.

Oppal greeted the class of 2022 with stories of his career, from lawyer to judge and attorney general, but in the end was set to leave them with single line of inspiration.

“The only advice I can say is be yourself, get out there and work hard,” concluded Oppal.