theBreaker.news Podcast: B.C.'s ex-top cop talks police reform, pollster says pandemic changed sports fan buying habits

For the week of Sept. 13, 2020.

On this edition of theBreaker.news Podcast, Kash Heed, B.C.’s former solicitor general, talks about the defund the police movement and agrees change is necessary.

“I have been calling for police reforms for 20 years now,” Heed told host Bob Mackin. “We’ve got police leaders that are still operating in a paradigm that is decades and decades old.”

Heed said police are supposed to be healers of conflict, but have strayed.

“We’ve moved to this paramilitary, if not a militarized way, that we’re policing our communities, that was never meant to be the role of a police officer.”

In B.C., taxpayers spend $1.6 billion on policing a year. Heed said there needs to be an audit of the costs and effectiveness.

Also, Pollster Mario Canseco of ResearchCo interprets the numbers from his latest research on how the pandemic has affected spending by sports fans in Canada and the U.S.

Plus some thoughts on Premier John Horgan’s early election trial balloon and how it can blow up in his face and headlines from the Pacific Rim and Pacific Northwest.

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.