Canadian Heritage Committee on Oct. 27th, 2016

[Lanni Marchant]

If you don't put us on TV there's not going to be more viewership. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy; you don't see us. Some men in athletics have some great stories, but you don't have to seek those stories to make those men great athletes. Yes, as I commented, there are so many amazing women with so many strong, amazing backgrounds and stories, but we're athletes. You can't argue there's no viewership if no channels are showing us.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Ms. Bujold, did you have anything to add to that?

[Mandy Bujold]

No. I think the more they show women in sport, the more viewership we're going to get. We have to get out there.

Yes, sharing a story can be important, especially around the Olympics, when we're trying to get to know athletes we don't already know. We want to get them out there, but we have to show it as much as we can and then people will start watching and think this is cool. The women's rugby sevens have had a lot of media attention and a lot of praise for how amazing they are as athletes. I think the more that people see them, the more there's going to be an interest in watching them live or on TV.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Do you see a link between the media coverage you have and the sponsorship opportunities you get?

[Lanni Marchant]

I see a little.

[Mandy Bujold]

Absolutely.

[Julie Dabrusin, Liberal, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

All right. Do you want to elaborate?

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I'm afraid I cannot allow them to elaborate, I'm sorry. We have run out of time.

We're going to a second round. It's going to be a tight three-minute round if we're going to get everybody in.

We have Mr. Maguire and Mr. Waugh sharing, with one and a half minutes each.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to congratulate you both as athletes representing our country. I know how much it takes. Once I decided I was going to be an athlete. I ran five miles and almost collapsed. It didn't take long to get me out of that. I got into the workforce as well.

Lanni, are you in Tennessee?

[Lanni Marchant]

I practise law in Tennessee, but I travel wherever training takes me.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Where do you train; is it mainly there?

[Lanni Marchant]

I train everywhere.

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

Okay. I'm more interested in the levels you talked about right now. Are Canadian qualifying levels different from what other countries would have for your events?

[Lanni Marchant]

In qualifying, yes. Most countries go by what the IAAF or the IOC sets as a qualifying mark. I'm not saying Canada's the only one that moves the mark, but we seem to be the only country without the depth that warrants moving that mark. If we were the U.S., the U.K., and we have six, seven, eight, nine, or ten girls capable of running these times, and you want to make it a more competitive team, fine. When you have one or two or maybe three women capable of even running under the IOC standard, why move the goalpost even farther?

[Larry Maguire, Conservative, Brandon—Souris, MB]

It doesn't matter to me if you finish 24th or 4th. From what you've just said, if we don't have anybody, it's fine. If you're not on TV you're not going to get more. If you're not running, you're never going to get to TV. My point is that, with athletes of both your levels competing, you've become bigger role models for that many more people. If there were eight of you instead of two or three, the whole country would know more about it. I wasn't aware that's how we did it compared to other countries.

I just talked about your track, and maybe boxing as well. Is there a parallel in all the other sports? If we can manage that, through Canada setting the standards for one sport, we can do it for them all. Is that done?

[Lanni Marchant]

My understanding for other sports is they'll have trials and it's the top three across the line. I'm not well versed enough in other sports to know necessarily if there are qualifying times or standards. I imagine in swimming there might. But when you look at our top swimmers, you see we have the depth there that maybe warrants it.

Mandy might be able to speak better on some of the other sporting sides.

[Mandy Bujold]

Yes, for us it actually comes down to our international committee that sets our qualification process. For us this time the top two in each continent had the opportunity to qualify. Then there was a world championship where you had to place in the top four. So everything was on an international level and not actually Canadian-specific.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much.

Mr. O'Regan, you have three minutes.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

I wanted to give you about a minute each just to make a closing statement because frankly I'm quite taken with both of your testimonies. They're both extremely considered and thoughtful and personal, and they'll be very important to us in our deliberations. If there's something that you missed or an important point that you want to leave with us to make sure that it's in our report, perhaps you'd like to take a minute each.

Ms. Marchant, maybe you want to begin.

[Lanni Marchant]

I believe I covered all the bases that I wanted to touch on. I recognize the role I play as an athlete in Canada and the more important role I play as a female athlete in Canada.

I've spent time since the Olympics speaking at several schools and at different expos and talking about getting out of my own way and the struggles that I faced as an athlete—body image, otherwise—but then also talking about the people and the federations that stood in my way as well. I meant it very much when I said that the athlete can't be the one who's constantly taking on these battles.

I don't know why...the women before me weren't making teams but they weren't standing up and arguing as loudly as I am. I don't know if it's because of the background I have or because, at the end of the day, I don't care. I want to represent Canada, and I would hope you want me out there representing you, but if you don't want me there, then fine, I'll find something else and excel at that. It might take more money and it might take more time, but the government and the different federations—Sport Canada and the COC—need to have our backs. If I'm willing to stand out there and be vocal and face the retribution or retaliation of my federation, I would hope that I'd be able to rely on you and on the bigger federations to come to my aid when I do need it.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Thank you.

[Mandy Bujold]

Yes, I agree 100%.

One instance I can relate to a bit was when we were preparing for the Olympics or for the Pan Am Games. There's one female coach who is registered and she is a very high-level coach, and we actually wanted to have her there in our corner. We had to fight with the federation and then we actually had to pay out of our own pockets to make sure we had a female coach in our corner at these major events.

I don't think that's right, but at the same time we're arguing against them, and then it puts us in a really bad position when we're trying to continue to excel in our careers. It becomes very difficult, but by using the female athletes we have right now, by spreading the word and just trying to really encourage young girls to get involved in sport, and for the right reasons, I think Canada can really be a leader for that. I'm just excited to see where we're going with this project.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Mr. Waugh.

[Kevin Waugh, Conservative, Saskatoon—Grasswood, SK]

Sport can be very brutal. I don't have to tell you that. We've heard it's very political.

So what can we do about pre-teens and teens? We have more failures in sports before we succeed. Do we have anything education-wise? We're starting to get sports psychologists involved. We're talking about females and young girls here, participating. Is there anything that government should do or organizations should do to lend support?

You both know you fail more in sports than you succeed, and sometimes at that age of 10, 11, 12, we can't take failure and we need somebody to draw upon once in awhile. And it can't be mom and dad; it has to be somebody else. So I'm just wondering. As we look at girls and women in sport we need supports.

I don't know where this comes in and I don't know what age it comes in but you can see the drop-off. As you said, you finish eighth, and everyone wants just the medal podium. How can we support our athletes more, the young ones coming up? That's the million-dollar question.

Start first, Mandy.

[Mandy Bujold]

if you think about where these girls are most of the time, they're in school, and so maybe we need to start with our teachers. Maybe there needs to be something in schools, and our teachers encouraging this a bit more than just gym class.

The other thing I said is that in grade 10, gym class is no longer mandatory. Why is it no longer mandatory? Are we teaching them that after that age you don't have to be involved in sport?

There are so many different things. We have to think about the people who see them most often and how we can get them to be more encouraging.

I didn't really have any teachers encouraging me to get involved in sports until I got involved in boxing. When I got involved in boxing, I had people trying to get me involved in wrestling or rugby, because they saw that maybe it was a cool fit. Before that, I never had a teacher or anyone come up to me and ask if I had thought about doing this outside of school.

Maybe it just needs to be a program in school. I don't know, but that's just my idea.