Calls for transparency over security-guard complaints in B.C.

Accountability activists in British Columbia say more transparency is needed around how complaints against security guards — especially serious allegations such as use of force and racial discrimination — are handled.

They say it's of particular concern because a significant portion of complaints to the province's regulator result in no sanction against guards or security companies, according to data obtained through a freedom of information (FOI) request and verified by CBC News.

Within both the FOI-requested dataset and publicly available figures, there is little further insight about how many complaints have involved more serious allegations, prompting a call from activists for the province to make more of the data public.

"Right now, people can't even draw their own conclusions because [the data] doesn't exist out there," said Stephen Harrison, a Victoria-based blogger and police accountability activist who made the FOI request earlier this year.

There's also concern that very few people are aware of the public complaints process in B.C. at all, especially as the province does not publicly post a list of disciplinary outcomes by the Registrar of Security Services (RSS) — unlike other jurisdictions, including Ontario.

The calls for transparency come following high-profile cases of security guards using excessive force in B.C. in recent years, including one being convicted of manslaughter in April after putting a mentally ill man in a headlock, and another pleading guilty to assault after breaking a man's arm in 2016.

Harrison said he requested the security guard data after a friend told him they witnessed a security guard at a Victoria grocery store restraining someone by pushing their face into the sidewalk.

There are two pieces of legislation governing the security industry in B.C. — the Security Services Act and Security Services Regulation.

The act primarily governs the conduct of security companies, while the regulation covers individual security guards' conduct. The FOI data shows 67 per cent of the complaints made from 2021 to 2023 pertained to the regulation.

However, no further breakdown is available.

More than 100 complaints per year, on average, have been made to the RSS since 2007, according to the FOI data, covering a range of allegations from companies employing unlicensed workers to excessive use of force by guards.

But the FOI statistics requested by Harrison show that, within that time, around two-thirds of the complaints made against security guards and companies in B.C. resulted in "no sanction." 

Harrison says that signals there's a problem.

"The statistics are showing that your complaints are likely to be dismissed or result in no discipline," he said. "The question would be, is this process working? Is this serving the people, necessarily?"