Change rooms lead to complaint

Human rights: BC Hockey accused of discrimination.

A complaint from a Salmon Arm hockey parent against BC Hockey, and others, of discriminating against female hockey players will go forward following a ruling from a B.C. Human Rights Tribunal last week.

The complaint alleges that change rooms for female players “are inferior to those facilities provided to male hockey players.” It was made by Corrine Shykula-Ross on behalf of her daughter Maggie and, along with BC Hockey, includes the Salmon Arm Minor Hockey Association, the Shuswap Recreation Society and the City of Salmon Arm as respondents.

In the complaint, Shykula-Ross contends that the situation at Sunwave Centre for female players often required them to change in the referees room in the back of the building, which is “unsupervised” and, because of its location, “raises safety concerns for female players.”

Further, in dealing with the alternate change room (change room one), the complaint states it’s “an unlocked space” and the result is “members of the public, including men, walking in despite there being a sign that it is used for females only.” It also notes that this particular changing room has no showers and does not provide access to the ice.

In the complaint, Shykula-Ross states there are “10 to 12 full change rooms in the (Sunwave) Centre that could be designated for females only” and that this situation is prevalent throughout the Okanagan at various arenas.

Also noted in the complaint is that because females are almost always the under-represented gender on co-ed teams, they change last and, in Maggie's experience, she has been required to change with members of the other team and has been called off the ice, during a game, to move her street clothes to another dressing room.

BC Hockey claimed that it has no authority to force individual associations or teams to follow its policies but, in her ruling, tribunal member Judy Parrack said, “I am not persuaded that BC Hockey has no role in ensuring that female hockey players, such as Maggie, have access to non-discriminatory dressing room facilities thus allowing them to participate fully in the hockey programs in B.C.”

SAMHA president Darrell Doussept said he thinks the association has done its best to make sure all female players who come to Salmon Arm “feel safe and secure and have a place to change.”

Regarding the complaint, he remarked, “It kind of came as a shock. Certainly, at the time, we felt we had complied with BC Hockey regulations and that there was nothing that we were doing that was wrong.”

He added that, since the complaint, SAMHA “has a policy in place that is superior to any association in the province.”

He said the integration of male and female players has been a learning curve for all involved.

“I think the issues have been passed down by BC Hockey to the municipal associations because there really are no guidelines they have for it either,” he said. “It’s not a pass-the-buck thing or anything like that... I don’t think that’s proper. I just think it’s a unique situation where we, as managers for BC Hockey and the municipal associations, have tried to do the best we can with females in an integrated system. For all the challenges everyone has, I think BC Hockey and SAMHA have done the best job they can to make it a safe place for females to play, that’s the bottom line.”

Sunwave Centre manager Dale Berger noted the Salmon Arm arena is “probably one of the best equipped facilities in the Interior as far as having dressing rooms available.

"We’ve done what we think works for the situation,” he said, questioning how far the complaint could be taken.

“Quite often there are only one or two girls on a team and the thing is here, we have two ice surfaces with the potential for four teams to have female players on them. We also have the potential of a ringette team having boys on it. It becomes a question of just how far do you want to go with this because we could be looking at additional dressing rooms just for that.”

Berger talked about the role of the Sunwave Centre with minor hockey.

“Our point is, we’re the facility and minor hockey rents the ice from us so they have to have a policy in place on how they use our facility. Working together, we feel we’ve addressed the situation. In regards to risk, we provide the space... Minor hockey has come up with a policy on how to manage that risk. It’s totally separate from what we do.”

Shykula-Ross’ lawyer Dan Soiseth declined comment.