Status of Women Committee on Feb. 13th, 2023

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

The first thing is that whenever a situation of abuse or maltreatment happens, the athletes need to have a safe mechanism—a safe place they can turn to, one that can investigate those cases and issue sanctions against the coaches, officials or other athletes who have been doing these things.

The other thing is that we need to review how organizations manage those cases. That's part of the problem we heard regarding Hockey Canada. In gymnastics and other cases, it's also how organizations deal with reports of abuse and maltreatment. We need to make sure there is accountability.

[Anna Roberts, Conservative, King—Vaughan, ON]

One thing you said earlier that really struck me—we spoke about this in the last couple of meetings—is breaking the code of silence. We heard from witnesses who feel uncomfortable coming forward, and afraid for their families.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

You have five seconds.

[Anna Roberts, Conservative, King—Vaughan, ON]

How do we protect witnesses and ensure this is a safe place for them?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

That's the challenge. When we're talking about investigations or inquiries, we need to make sure that it's a safe place, that it's trauma-informed and that victims are going to be well taken care of. It is part of the challenge to which we need to find solutions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Perfect. Thank you so much.

We're now going to move over to Emmanuella Lambropoulos for six minutes.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you, Minister, for being here to answer some of our questions today.

I was happy to hear you mention that only part of this is actually falling under federal jurisdiction. There are only 3,700 athletes who will be affected by what we put in place.

In the coming weeks, you'll be meeting with your provincial and territorial counterparts. Could you go a little deeper into what these discussion will entail?

You'll be mentioning, of course, that there's a bit of a crisis on our hands and that it needs to be taken seriously. Are there concrete actions you're going to be suggesting that they take? Can you let us know what those might be?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Yes, absolutely.

I met my counterparts at the last Canada Games this summer in Niagara. All the provinces committed to either creating their own independent mechanisms.... Instead of creating their own, the federal government has also offered assistance to the provinces and territories. If they wish, they can sign up with the Office of the Sport Integrity Commissioner. It is open to them.

I know that some provinces are currently in discussions with OSIC. At the end of this week, I'm going to ask my counterparts where they are at in doing this, because it should be a priority all across the country. As we've witnessed, there's a huge gap in the system. It needs to be closed as soon as possible.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

Many of the problems lie within the culture of sports teams, and, just in general, the culture of sport in Canada. We heard often from witnesses who were victims of the types of crimes that we're discussing. They never felt comfortable enough to come forward on their own. Other adults in the room could have been possibly aware of what was happening to them, but nobody spoke up. They were afraid of whistleblowing.

What are some of the concrete changes that your office has thought of, or come up with, that can encourage individuals who are witnessing such a thing to come forward if they are within the organization?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

The first thing was making sure that the reporting system was out of the hands of the organizations themselves. This is why having an independent mechanism is so important, so that adults, children, and athletes can report those situations. There can be proper investigations and proper sanctions, or recommendations can be made regarding the organization, but this is not enough. We need to make sure that in the end, those sanctions and recommendations are also applied. We need to make sure that the management and decision-making is appropriate.

This is why we're also working with Sport Canada. It's so we can better assess whether or not the organizations are achieving the criteria we set for them. This was lacking. We're currently working on having a new expertise and new tools to assess the organizations.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

In terms of training coaches, what is it that we can do or add? In what ways is the federal government able to do something about what exactly is being shown, or how they're being trained?

Even after the fact, is there a way of keeping track and making sure that people take an extra course down the road just to make sure they're keeping up with the times, because things might be very different from what they were, let's say, 20 years ago?

Can you comment on that?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

This is part of the discussions that need to be held and the work that needs to be done, particularly with the Coaching Association of Canada, which provides training to coaches. We need to make sure that accredited coaches take this training. However, this also needs to be done on an ongoing basis within the organizations.

The whole issue of the universal code of conduct also needs to be discussed; this needs to be taught to everyone involved, that is, not only coaches, but also officials and athletes, so that they know their rights, responsibilities and what behaviours are acceptable and which are not. Of course, all of this must be done in conjunction with the provinces, territories and all the authorities involved.

What's important is to have consistency within the system. At the moment it's very patchy. That's part of what we need to work on.

I look forward to reading the committee's recommendations in this regard.

[Emmanuella Lambropoulos, Liberal, Saint-Laurent, QC]

You talked briefly about the Office of the Sport Integrity Commissioner, which was set up about six months ago.

Did the testimony you heard highlight some things that should be changed?

Has the testimony about how to improve the existing process been taken into account ?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

As you said, the mechanism is quite new. It is always possible to do better. That is why I look forward to the committee's recommendations.

One of the things we are looking at right now is the possibility of creating a registry that will record the names of all athletic coaches who are sanctioned. There are issues with that, including privacy issues, but we're looking at what we can do to prevent coaches from moving from province to province or sport to sport after being found guilty of abuse or mistreatment.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you very much.

We're now going to move over to Sébastien Lemire.

You have six minutes.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I thank the members of the committee for their welcome.

First, let me acknowledge the absence of my colleague Andréanne Larouche, who proposed this study, and thank her for her leadership in this regard. She is currently in New York, working for the Canadian Group of the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Please excuse her absence.

Madam Minister, thank you for being here today to participate in this important study. Indeed, I thank you for highlighting its importance in your opening remarks.

You said something that gave me food for thought, and I would just like us to take a few seconds to reflect together. In your view, the question is not whether we should do something—that's a weighty thing to say—but above all how we should do it. You have to examine it with a thought for the athletes who have been victims of this abuse and mistreatment, whether it is financial, psychological, physical or sexual.

To say how it should be done is a bit like trivializing it. It's like trying to put a band-aid on without making the proper diagnosis, a diagnosis of cancer rather than an apparent flesh wound, for example.

We need to think about children and all athletes who play sports in various disciplines. In my opinion, the real way to do this is through an independent inquiry, which will allow us to fully understand the mechanisms involved.

Let me refer to Mr. Martin Leclerc's article, published this morning, on the toxic culture in hockey. This is one example among many sports, and it happens more in a male than in a female context. Nevertheless, the gravity of the abuse could not have been foreseen, nor could we know that people in positions of authority glossed over these actions.

If we focus only on the “how”, I think we miss the “if”. We need to look at reality and what mechanisms we can put in place to get these people to stop protecting each other, within the apparatus. There's still time ahead of us, but time is running out.

Madam Minister, you have been in office for over a year, but I do not get the impression that our sporting community has become safer in the last year. You know how critical it is to look at what is wrong with our sports ecosystem, both at the amateur and professional level.

The sports community and the Canadian public have been calling on us for several months, if not years if you consider your predecessors, to hold a judicial inquiry into sport. It is necessary. They are not doing it to confirm that there was abuse and mistreatment, not to confirm the "if", but to find concrete solutions to strengthen our ecosystem. We're going to have to do that. I've mentioned the linkages with other departments, including the Department of Industry, the Competition Bureau, the Canada Revenue Agency, the Department of Justice and Health Canada. We need to look at how we can take a truly comprehensive view.

To date, you have flatly refused appeals from more than 1,000 elite athletes related to 14 sports, which included being heard by the committee. You have also rejected the appeal of the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport, the Coaching Association of Canada, several national sports organizations, and two Canadian research initiatives involving over 100 Canadian academics. All of these people are in favour of a national public inquiry to answer the “how”, how we are going to tackle the toxic culture in sport.

The “how” question has been addressed in the past and nothing has changed for years. I must acknowledge the leadership of one of your predecessors, Ms. Kirsty Duncan, who really tried to make a difference. I continue to feel every day that our children are still at risk. We still feel that your position is counterproductive to that struggle.

Concretely, will you be able to act, publicly and transparently, to ensure a change in culture? We want to know the outcome of the audits that may have been done and the nature of the athletes' experiences.

What we find is that things only move when they are made public and there is outrage, or when we realize that they are unacceptable. Otherwise, the machine constantly protects itself.

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

As I said in my opening remarks, it's not a question of whether we're going to do something, but how we're going to do it. I want to come back to how to do it, because it's important.

Victims have told me that they don't want to go through the traumatic experience they went through again. So it's very important to me that the mechanism we put in place is a safe and conducive way to have an investigation that is commensurate with the seriousness of what these people have gone through.

I have also made it clear that we are currently working to find the right way to do things to achieve two objectives, which I think address the concerns you have raised. The first objective is to shed light on the events and to give people a forum to express themselves on what they have experienced in the sports world. The second is to look at everything that has been done so far in the Canadian sports system, to take stock, and then to make recommendations on the next steps and what more needs to be done to ensure the safety of athletes.

I understand that this may not be moving fast enough for some, but my priority is to get things right. It's as important as doing them.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Have you ever been pressured by colleagues or others to discourage you from supporting or launching an independent public inquiry?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

No.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you so much. We're now going to move to Bonita Zarrillo for the next six minutes .

Bonita, you have six minutes.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the minister for being at the committee today.

I want to follow up on what my colleague was saying about the diagnosis. I'm hearing a deflection of jurisdiction, a little bit of passing the buck happening here, and I'm very concerned about it. It's 2023, and I think about how many thousands of children are being hurt. This is a conversation that's happened for decades in sport, and here we are in 2023 with little change.

In thinking about abuse of kids and how it has forever changed their lives, it just doesn't seem good enough to have after-the-fact research alone. I think we need multiple prongs on this. I think we need to be able to filter out abusers before they get into the system.

Minister, how are you doing that? How are you ensuring that it's not just analysis after the fact, but that there is a filter and that no abusers will be getting into the system?

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Well, first of all, I want to make it clear that I'm not passing the buck to anyone. However, the reality is that the sport system touches multiple jurisdictions, and I can't fix it alone. We need to work collectively and together to make sure that all parts of the sport system are improved and that the appropriate actions are taken.

Some of the abuse we've heard about happens in schools, in local clubs, and some of it is also at the national level. We need to make sure that we're all committed to ensuring the safety of athletes at all levels. I'm taking my responsibility and I'm using all my leadership that I possibly can to have those conversations with my counterparts from the provinces and territories so that we can work together in improving the system.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Minister, I'm going to ask about the culture change, which was also talked about with some of my colleagues. I can hear in your voice that it's a challenge. I can hear that in your voice.

However, I'm looking at the Physical Activity and Sport Act, and there are two bullets that I'm looking at. One is,

to increase participation in the practice of sport and support the pursuit of excellence in sport;

and the second is,

to build capacity in the Canadian sport system.

I wonder how you would interpret the words “excellence in sport” as they're written in the Physical Activity and Sport Act.

[Pascale St-Onge, Liberal, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

I think it needs to be redefined, and it's part of the conversation. Work currently being done on the renewal of the Canadian sport policy involves not only the federal government but also the provinces, territories, municipalities and community groups.

The discussion is truly about how we define excellence. In previous mandates I would say that it was about medals and podiums; now we need to take into account the excellence of the organizations themselves and how they bring the well-being of athletes into a holistic approach.

The renewal of the Canadian Sport Policy also stems from the need to revisit the values that form the foundation of the sport system. What is most important, beyond medals and podiums, is ensuring the safety and well-being of athletes in all respects.