Federal government should cover retroactive RCMP pay: SUMA, Sask. government

The Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association says it's extremely disappointed that the federal government has not yet committed to paying the retroactive salary of Saskatchewan's RCMP officers.

Thousands of Mounties will see their salaries rise thanks to the first collective agreement in RCMP history. Last summer, the federal government and the union representing RCMP members ratified an agreement to deliver a sizeable pay increase to nearly 20,000 members.

Beginning April 1, constables — who account for more than half of all Canadian RCMP officers  —  will make up to $106,576 — a jump of $20,000 since April 2016.

The agreement also lays out retroactive pay increases to cover the period when the two sides were negotiating.

According to the Government of Saskatchewan, municipalities policed by the RCMP will be invoiced $24.21 million in 2022-23.

"We were not at the table for those negotiations — municipalities were not included. And we feel that it's the federal government that did those negotiations, they should be picking up the cost of the retroactive pay," said SUMA president Randy Goulden. 

Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino says the RCMP needs to offer fair compensation to recruit and retain officers. He also hinted that talks are in the works to address the added cost to municipalities.

"The short answer is … yes," he said on March 30. "We're working very closely with municipalities as well as with provincial governments who contract the RCMP as the police of jurisdiction."

However, there was no mention of funding for RCMP in the 2022 federal budget, which was released on Thursday.

"We were extremely disappointed that this was not in the budget. We had hoped it would. I guess we would take minister Mendicino saying that, you know, they're in discussions, so perhaps this can be added later. I don't know the process and how that can be done," Gould said.

Goulden, who is also a city councillor in Yorkton, said SUMA believes the retroactive pay is too great a load to carry right now.

"It's coming at a time where our budgets have already been set and we cannot deficit budget," Goulden said. "The 24 per cent [increase] for the community of Yorktown is $1.6 million. That's a significant amount of money."

Goulden says the federal government might delay the retro-pay invoices, but that's not enough.

However, Goulden says, SUMA understands Mendicino's comments about RCMP needing the money to recruit and retain officers.