Toronto Pride Parade to kick off despite tensions between police, LGBTQ community

Swaths of Toronto will burst with colour today as LGBTQ revellers hit the streets for the Pride Parade against a backdrop of tensions between the community and the city’s police force.

More than 120 groups will march along the downtown route in this year’s parade – but uniformed officers won’t be among them.

Tensions involving police and the parade started brewing in 2016, when members of Black Lives Matter abruptly halted the march to present several demands, among them that uniformed police, their floats and cruisers be excluded.

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The group cited tensions between the force and black citizens arising from racial profiling, among other things.

This year, Toronto police came under fire from the LGBTQ community for accusations that they failed to take the disappearances of gay men seriously for years – until January, when they arrested 66-year-old landscaper Bruce McArthur, who currently faces eight first-degree murder charges.

This will be the second year uniformed officers have been excluded from the parade, but police will be on hand as the streets are expected to be flooded with as many as a million spectators.