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Montreal police officers will no longer be able to wear a controversial Thin Blue Line badge that some members of the police force have sported in the past.
On Tuesday, Montreal police Chief Fady Dagher presented a new badge to replace it during a closed door meeting before the city of Montreal’s public safety committee.
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In a release, the Montreal police said the meeting was held as part of Dagher’s “updated procedure relating to dress and maintenance. It was on this occasion that he communicated the position of his management regarding the wearing of the Thin Blue Line badge and that he unveiled the creation of a new symbol specific to the SPVM to honour their sisters and brothers who died in duty.
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“The Thin Blue Line crest has been a critical topic of discussions about the new dress and maintenance procedure.”
The Thin Blue Line badge worn by some Montreal police officers features a black and white Canadian flag with a horizontal blue line through it. It is similar to one featuring the American flag, which has long been worn by some U.S. law enforcement officers to show solidarity among police officers or support for fallen comrades. But critics argue it has come, since 2014, to be associated with the “Blue Lives Matter” movement, a pro-police movement that arose in response to Black Lives Matter.
In 2022, Marikym Gaudreault, a spokesperson for the city of Montreal’s executive committee, said it had “a discomfort with this symbol, which divides the population.” She also said back then that the Montreal police were conducting a complete review of the standards applicable to police uniforms. The comments were made after some Montreal police officers were photographed wearing the badges at a rally that attracted thousands in support of the truckers’ protest against COVID-19 restrictions
“The internal procedure relating to the appearance and maintenance of SPVM personnel had not been revised since 2005. Twenty years later, it therefore became essential to update it to new contemporary realities,” the Montreal police said in its release. “It was also important to remind police officers, through this modernized procedure, that their duty of impartiality in interventions must also be reflected in their clothing and physical appearance, that they must not display bias for a cause more than another. The Montreal police thus makes its uniform neutral, out of respect for all the populations it serves.”
The new procedure will take effect after the summer.
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