Bill C-77 (Historical)

An Act to amend the National Defence Act and to make related and consequential amendments to other Acts

This enactment amends provisions of the National Defence Act governing the military justice system.
It adds a new Division, entitled “Declaration of Victims Rights”, to the Code of Service Discipline, that specifies that victims of service offences have a right to information, protection, participation and restitution in respect of service offences. It adds or amends several definitions, including “victim” and “military justice system participant”, and specifies who may act on a victim’s behalf for the purposes of that Division.
It amends Part III of that Act to, among other things,
(a) specify the purpose of the Code of Service Discipline and the fundamental purpose of imposing sanctions at summary hearings;
(b) protect the privacy and security of victims and witnesses in proceedings involving certain sexual offences;
(c) specify factors that a military judge is to take into consideration when determining whether to make an exclusion order;
(d) make testimonial aids more accessible to vulnerable witnesses;
(e) allow witnesses to testify using a pseudonym in appropriate cases;
(f) on application, make publication bans for victims under the age of 18 mandatory;
(g) in certain circumstances, require a military judge to inquire of the prosecutor if reasonable steps have been taken to inform the victims of any plea agreement entered into by the accused and the prosecutor;
(h) provide that the acknowledgment of the harm done to the victims and to the community is a sentencing objective;
(i) provide for different ways of presenting victim impact statements;
(j) allow for military impact statements and community impact statements to be considered for all service offences;
(k) provide, as a principle of sentencing, that particular attention should be given to the circumstances of Aboriginal offenders;
(l) provide for the creation, in regulations, of service infractions that can be dealt with by summary hearing;
(m) provide for a scale of sanctions in respect of service infractions and for the principles applicable to those sanctions;
(n) provide for a six-month limitation period in respect of summary hearings; and
(o) provide superior commanders, commanding officers and delegated officers with jurisdiction to conduct a summary hearing in respect of a person charged with having committed a service infraction if the person is at least one rank below the officer conducting the summary hearing.
Finally, the enactment makes related and consequential amendments to certain Acts. Most notably, it amends the Criminal Code to include military justice system participants in the class of persons against whom offences relating to intimidation of a justice system participant can be committed.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

General Lamarre, it's good to see you again. Thank you for being with us with your team.

Thank you, all, for your service to our nation.

My questions are going to fall under the broad rubric of women and peace and security. I say this with respect to both promoting the project within the armed forces and members who currently serve, but also as a way to recruit more women into the armed forces, including international service and peacekeeping missions.

I wanted to ask if you've had a chance to review the ombudsperson's report. It's the Office of the Federal Ombudsman for Victims of Crime, and there's probably room for a name change there. Heidi Illingworth is the ombudsperson and she made recommendations on Bill C-77 this month.

Has this document been shared with members of your team?

[James Bezan, Conservative, Selkirk—Interlake—Eastman, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Richard.

Gentlemen, it's great having you at the committee again.

Colonel Jetly, it's always great seeing you. We did a lot of work together on mental health within the armed forces.

As you know, there has been quite a bit of discussion around paragraph 98(c) of the National Defence Act, which isn't in Bill C-77. However, there is quite a bit of concern that it adds to the stigmatization of mental health within the armed forces, and possibly hasn't been used in the past.

Colonel Jetly, could you respond from a mental health perspective, if that section prevents people from coming forward?

[Mark Gerretsen, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thanks to our delegation for being here today to answer some of our questions.

I want to focus my questions on the issue of the minor sanctions. We know that minor sanctions and expressions will be defined under the regulations instead of through Bill C-77. Can you comment on the benefit of defining them under regulation instead of through legislation on specific cases?

[Lieutenant-General Charles Lamarre, Commander, Military Personnel Command, Department of National Defence]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

First, I am Lieutenant-General Chuck Lamarre. I'm commander of military personnel command, the organization that recruits, trains and does the care, service, pay and so on and so forth for all of our members. We assist with the eventual transition out of military as well. Thank you for inviting us to come here and speak to you today.

The care and support of all Canadian Armed Forces personnel are of paramount importance to our operational success. Our military justice system deals with people, and it is also critical to operational success, so I'm pleased to have the opportunity to engage in the committee's study of Bill C-77.

I will introduce our experts in a moment. They will also be able to provide details and answers to all of your questions.

I want to start by stating, however, that the Canadian Armed Forces has a system of care that is world class and available to all of our members. The CAF health system has 37 clinics, of which 31 have in-house mental health professionals. There are approximately 465 dedicated mental health positions distributed among those 31 clinics.

In addition, there are over 4,000 mental health care providers in the civilian system who have registered to provide care to military members in their own practices.

Finally, we have also teamed up with Veterans Affairs Canada to create the Canadian Armed Forces and Veterans Affairs Canada joint suicide prevention strategy, which was launched on October 5, 2017.

The experts we have with us today can speak more to the excellent level of care that we provide to our members. They are Colonel Peter Clifford, deputy surgeon general, and Colonel Rakesh Jetly, senior psychiatrist and mental health adviser for the Canadian Armed Forces.

Mr. Chair and members of the committee, the leadership of the Canadian Armed Forces has a duty to proceed from the point of view of care and compassion towards all of our members. It is part of the profession of arms, a code of conduct for all members of the Canadian Armed Forces that is underpinned by a high standard of values and ethics.

In instances where a member has committed an act of self-harm, the foremost priority of leadership is to provide care and support to that member. It is not to charge or punish a member in already difficult circumstances, and we do not.

We are also happy to have with us today two of our legal experts, Colonel Steve Strickey, deputy judge advocate general, military justice; and Lieutenant-Colonel Geneviève Lortie, director of law, military justice and policy. This is their second appearance before the committee, and they would be pleased to address any legal issues surrounding the study of this bill.

We take the health and well-being of our members, including their mental health, very seriously. Our members are always our highest priority.

We look forward to answering your questions.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Welcome, everybody, to the defence committee this afternoon. To our guests, my apologies for being late. We had a vote and it took some time.

In the interest of time, I'm going to introduce Lieutenant-General Charles Lamarre, who will speak on Bill C-77.

I understand and appreciate that you have a number of colleagues here, but to save time, I'll turn the floor over to you for your opening remarks. Then we can get to questions. I understand that you have to leave by 12:45. We'll endeavour to get you out of here at that time.

Sir, the floor is yours.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Davenport, Lib.]

Wonderful. Thank you so much.

Thank you for being here, Minister Sajjan, and thank you to the deputy minister and her team. Thank you for honouring the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I.

Few people know this, but in my 13-square-kilometre riding of Davenport in downtown west Toronto, I have a cemetery that has the largest number of burials of World War I veterans and allied members, at 5,300. It's actually very beautiful. We have an extra-special celebration taking place this Sunday. I just wanted to mention that.

Minister, as part of your remarks, you talked a bit about diversity. Our committee will be moving on to a study of diversity after we've concluded Bill C-77. In light of the events in Saint-Jean reported this spring, and the recent media articles around extreme right and white supremacist views in some Canadian Armed Forces members, I wonder if you might go on record saying something about this.

As well, could you take a moment to talk about diversity and how it is indeed our strength and an essential part of mission success?

[LCol (Ret'd) Jean-Guy Perron]

No, I don't think you would be examining the Constitution.

The Supreme Court of Canada provides a two-part test to determine whether a proceeding is administrative, penal or criminal in nature.

The 2015 Guindon decision from the Supreme Court of Canada, which basically reiterates the test from Wigglesworth and Martineau, gives us the guidelines to assess a situation and to determine whether we are dealing with something that's purely administrative in nature and procedure, and therefore the administrative law applies, or whether it's criminal or penal, and therefore the higher standards apply. This, for me, is the exercise that must be undertaken when examining Bill C-77.

[Richard Martel, Conservative, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

I have a question for Mr. Lévesque.

Please describe, if you would, how the Beaudry decision will impact Bill C-77.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

I would like to look at two mechanisms that are proposed by Bill C-77 that exist in the civilian world and are used frequently there, restitution orders and restraining orders.

Mr. Lévesque, you spoke about restraining orders earlier. For either of you, how important is it that those two mechanisms are now embedded in Bill C-77? How often are they invoked? Generally, are you favourably inclined toward the provisions in Bill C-77 on these two provisions?

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

We appreciate that. It's important to get your perspective, so thank you for that.

The other broad question I wanted to ask you—you've given advice internationally at the level of the UN—was about how our partners and allies are doing on conduct and service discipline. We often look to Australia, New Zealand, the U.K., the U.S. as potential models for peacekeeping or collaboration on security matters. What about conduct and service discipline? Have you done any research there? Are there any opportunities for us to look at their practices in informing our discussion on Bill C-77?

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

In terms of gender impact in the application or also in what a young woman might look at in the recruitment stage with respect to the work environment she would step into as a member of the Canadian Armed Forces who would be subject to service discipline under Bill C-77, you don't see anything that would be concerning along gender lines?

[LCol (Ret'd) Jean-Guy Perron]

No. As I reviewed Bill C-77 focusing on the disciplinary aspect, the summary trial, summary hearings, I cannot say that I perceived any aspect of those provisions that would make me wonder if there was a gender aspect or an issue that is significant.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Mr. Chair, thank you very much.

Thank you all for being here, for your service and for your expertise and your advocacy.

Mrs. Fynes, my condolences on the passing of your son, Corporal Stuart Langridge. It is my hope that through our conversation here today we are able to honour his life and honour his service, and to honour the service of all members of the Canadian Forces who died because they made a decision to take their own lives.

We heard you loud and clear that a member of the Canadian Forces who seeks help for reasons of mental health should be supported and not punished. Thank you for making that point.

My question is for Lieutenant-Colonel Perron. There are a lot of conversations throughout our government and globally on the need to have greater participation of women in our armed forces. The women, peace and security agenda and Canada's Elsie initiative on women in peace operations resonate broadly into the United Nations and beyond.

Are there gender dimensions to the points you have made to the committee earlier? In other words, do any of the recommendations, the points you have identified as worthy of attention, line up differently depending upon whether they apply to men or women, either in current practice or post-Bill C-77?

[Yves Robillard, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Bill C-77 will amend the National Defence Act to incorporate indigenous sentencing considerations. Military tribunals will be required to take into account the circumstances of indigenous offenders when determining sentences.

Could you please explain how sentencing will take into account the circumstances of indigenous offenders under Bill C-77?

[Yves Robillard, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Very well.

My next questions are for Ms. Haddadi and Mr. Lévesque.

Bill C-77 provides for the designation of a victim's liaison officer at the victim's request. That person's job is to assist the victim during the process.

Would victim liaison officers be able to provide legal advice to the victims they are responsible for assisting?