National Defence committee  I think the best thing to do is to come right to our expert here, who is our provost marshal. Could I ask you, Colonel Delaney, please to answer Ms. Gallant?

National Defence committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. In fact, I remember those articles, as will you and many around the table, and certainly all of us in uniform, when they came out. Since 1998 a tremendous number of policies, programs, and education opportunities have been put in place that have bolstered a

National Defence committee  No, I believe that any organization like ours that requires men and women to work in close quarters, both in offices and out in operations, will always deal with problems of sexual misconduct. I think that there is more to be done in that area. What I would like to say is that th

National Defence committee  Our policies are firm. They're very clear, and the individuals we have on the ground to look after all of our men and women in uniform are our commanding officers. Everybody who is operating out there belongs to a unit that is commanded by a person who has responsibility for them

National Defence committee  What we will do once we've identified the individual is to bring them in and make very clear that within the freedom that we will provide for them to speak to anyone across our bases and wings and ships, we will need an assessment of our processes and procedures, our policies, an

National Defence committee  As required.

National Defence committee  That's right. Members in uniform may only speak outside the chain of command when authorized to do so by the chain of command. This individual would be working completely with the support from the chain of command.

National Defence committee  There are actually many ways that someone who feels they've suffered a sexual misconduct of any kind can report that. If they find themselves in danger, of course, immediately they have access to 911, as do all Canadians. They also have access to civilian police if they're off a

National Defence committee  That depends very much on the nature of the complaint. In fact, if the complainant needs to be protected from that individual, there may need to be a separation of those parties. Or, if that individual believes this can be dealt with at a lower level, through an harassment resolu

National Defence committee  Immediately upon reading these articles, one of the things that was most upsetting for me as the Canadian Chief of the Defence—

National Defence committee  The internal review, ma'am, was designed to provide me what I believed was faith in a set of policies that had been indicated to have decreased harassment of all kinds greatly since 1998. With the publication of recent articles, I needed to be sure that these policies were in pla

National Defence committee  We're looking for a distinguished Canadian, hopefully with judicial background, who would be willing to take this review on.

National Defence committee  Thank you very much, sir. I'll pass it on.

National Defence committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members, for giving me and my colleagues the opportunity to speak to you today about an issue that clearly is of deep concern to us all. Like you, I have read and reread the articles recently published in L'actualité and Maclean's on sexual mi

National Defence committee  The equipment that has come back from theatre is tired. We're in the process right now of refurbishing that and bringing that back up. You speak to the way ahead. The tactical armed patrol vehicle is the way forward for the army. They'll be very much looking forward to receivin