NEW From yearning for a change to cost of living, why some Canadians have left or may leave the country
For some immigrants, their dreams of permanently settling in Canada have taken an unexpected twist.
Black children in England and Wales were six times more likely to be strip-searched by police, according to a report being released Monday that found children were failed by those sworn to protect them.
Children's Commissioner Rachel de Souza found nearly 3,000 children were strip-searched between 2018 and mid-2022 and more than half the searches were conducted without an appropriate adult present.
The investigation was launched after a Black 15-year-old girl suspected of having marijuana was strip-searched at a London school in 2020 by two female officers without another adult present. The girl, identified as "Child Q," was menstruating and no drugs were found. A previous report said racism was a likely factor for the humiliating search.
"The bravery of a girl to speak up about a traumatic thing that happened to her" led to the report that found "widespread noncompliance" of safeguards and evidence of a "deeply concerning practice," de Souza said.
The findings follow a scathing report last week that found the public had lost confidence in London's Metropolitan Police and that the force was plagued with institutional racism, misogyny and homophobia and didn't do enough to remove bad officers. That report was commissioned after an officer raped and killed a young woman.
The new report said children as young as 8 were being searched in places that were often inappropriate, such as amusement parks or vehicles and sometimes even within public view. In some cases, at least one officer present was of a gender different than the child being searched.
More than a third of the 2,847 searches were of Black children, making them more than six times more likely to be searched based on population figures, the report said. White children were about half as likely to be searched.
De Souza called the disparity "utterly unacceptable."
The Runnymede Trust, a race equality think tank, said the findings were "even harder to absorb" than the report about the Metropolitan Police, which has faced critical reports in the past. The trust called for removing police from schools and revoking their authority to strip-search children.
"Officers are often unable to justify the necessity of strip-searching, nor can they report on the safeguarding impact on the child concerned," the group said. "Quite the contrary. It also confirms that our policing crisis is not just confined to London, it is national."
De Souza said strip-searches can be necessary but there need to be "robust safeguards" to protect children.
Among her 17 recommendations, she called on the Home Office to review legislation and policy for searches and make specific changes to police and criminal evidence codes.
A spokesperson said the Home Office takes safeguarding children extremely seriously.
"Strip-search is one of the most intrusive powers available to the police," the spokesperson said. "No one should be subject to strip-search on the basis of race or ethnicity and safeguards exist to prevent this."
De Souza also called on the National Police Chief's Council to publish a plan to reform child searches.
Chief Constable Craig Guildford said the council welcomed the scrutiny and would consider the findings.
For some immigrants, their dreams of permanently settling in Canada have taken an unexpected twist.
Studies have shown that ultraprocessed foods can have a detrimental impact on health. But 30 years of research show they don’t all have the same impact.
Forging ahead with increasing Canada's capital gains inclusion rate 'sows division,' and is a 'shortsighted' way to improve the deficit, business groups are warning Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland.
An Ontario man considering having his driveway paved received a quote from a company for $7,000, but then, another paver in the neighbourhood knocked on his door and offered half that rate.
Stormy Daniels will return to the witness stand Thursday in Donald Trump's hush money trial as the defence tries to undermine the credibility of the porn actor's salacious testimony about their alleged sexual encounter and the money she was paid to keep quiet.
Amid evidence of rising breast cancer rates among young women in Canada, one Toronto startup is offering a contactless and radiation-free device that can help doctors identify suspicious changes in breast tissue. The company, Linda Lifetech, says this can lead to earlier detection of breast cancer.
Forecasters warned a wave of dangerous storms in the U.S. could wash over parts of the South early Thursday, a day after severe weather with damaging tornadoes and large hail killed at least three people in the region.
Toronto police say a man was taken into custody outside Drake's Bridle Path mansion Wednesday afternoon after he tried to gain access to the residence.
There is currently a whooping cough epidemic in Europe, with 10 times as many cases compared to the previous two years. While an outbreak has not been declared nationwide in Canada, whooping cough is regularly detected in the country.
The stakes have been set for a bet between Vancouver and Edmonton's mayors on who will win Round 2 of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
A grieving mother is hosting a helmet drive in the hopes of protecting children on Manitoba First Nations from a similar tragedy that killed her daughter.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
A P.E.I. lighthouse and a New Brunswick river are being honoured in a Canada Post series.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.