Thank you so much.
I have a number of concerns with the motion. I've addressed a lot of them in camera, so I will be very careful about what I say, but I've also been public with my concerns about the direction this committee is heading in.
It comes back to a situation where, after one of the meetings we had with Hockey Canada, I was in scrums, like many of us were after the committee meeting, and one of the reporters asked me questions. What are your recommendations for Hockey Canada? What are your recommendations from this committee? What do you think the committee is going to do going forward? I see that is point (v) in the motion. It was almost embarrassing to say, “We don't have any.”
We've heard from Hockey Canada witnesses, and we've been very good at showing to Canadians in a non-partisan way that Hockey Canada wasn't an organization that could be trusted. There was outstanding work done by members of the media to amplify that and to give us more information to go after and press Hockey Canada on, but we haven't even scratched the surface of the problems in sports in this country.
We haven't heard from experts. We haven't heard from academics. I know—and I don't know who else is the audience—that we have a representative from Gymnasts for Change in the gallery. We're not even mentioning other sports.
I know that it's Canada and it's hockey and that's the sport that's most likely to get the attention. It's the sport that's most likely to get the members of the media here to cover our committee meetings, which, with respect to them, can be occasionally dull—not when we're dealing with Hockey Canada but on other topics we've dealt with.
We owe it to kids to truly expand this. I don't know if for any meeting we've had we can really say to ourselves that we've made sports safer for kids. I think that was our goal. I think that, for all of us, when we started down this path and we heard about the horrific sexual assaults, we wanted to take action.
I don't want to speak for other members. Maybe I'll just speak for myself. I wanted to take action. The more that we heard about it.... We heard about the toxic culture in hockey. We heard about the issues in Hockey Canada. We've gone in a lot of different directions on Hockey Canada, especially in relation to their governance and in relation to how they operate and reserve funds and so on and so forth, but have we made hockey safer for kids? I don't know. I guess we'll see what the new board does, but I don't know that I have any recommendations for Hockey Canada.
We've just heard from Justice Cromwell, who made a number of recommendations and who is a highly respected jurist but ultimately has been paid by Hockey Canada to do this summary. I would love to hear from academics who study this, who have looked into Hockey Canada and who have looked into the hockey system in this country for decades and have things to say and things to tell us.
I think the CHL has gone almost completely unscathed from our view and, having seen reports, having seen issues and having heard evidence and stories about what's going on, there are some serious problems there. Hockey Canada doesn't control them. Hockey Canada borrows those players for a period of time.
My recommendation.... I guess I'll stop talking, because I see a number of others on the list, but let's go in camera. Let's really figure out a reasonable study. Let's expand it so that we have opportunities to call witnesses and opportunities to really build this and to have the minister appear if we have a broader study.
She has already appeared on the Hockey Canada issue, but I think that in terms of the study, which is “Safe Sport in Canada”, let's bring this forward. We need to have more than two meetings. I'm not the minister's parliamentary secretary. I don't know if she is available on these days.
Let's actually have a broader study. Let's protect kids. Let's talk about things like gymnastics, rugby, soccer, bobsleigh and all of the sports we're hearing about. This is a horrible incident. This is athlete-on-fan violence. That's a terrible thing. It deserves Parliament's attention. I commend all of my colleagues for the incredible work that they have done on this.
Most of the other stories that we're hearing from the other sports are coach-on-athlete violence, harassment and torment. Why aren't we dealing with that? Why isn't that at the centre of the these motions?
I truly think we need to expand this. This is my plea to members of the committee. Let's go in camera. Let's expand this. Call the minister and Sport Canada officials as part of that study. Let's also arm ourselves with the knowledge to ask those questions. Let's hear from academics. We're saying Sport Canada needs to do better. It probably does or it maybe does, but how?
We're asking Sport Canada to do our work for us to create a report. Then we'll critique the report and report back to the House of Commons. I think that's the reverse order. I think it should be incumbent on us as members of Parliament to be asking those questions, bringing in those witnesses and coming up with those recommendations.
I hope there isn't disagreement. Calling the minister and Sport Canada officials can be and should be part of a broader study on this. Let's hear from some of the other organizations as well. Let's actually do what we said we were going set out to do and protect kids.
I don't think we're doing that. I think we're falling well short of our goal. I don't think that's the intention and I don't want to suggest otherwise. I know Mr. Lemire has been steadfast in his desire and push for changes in sport. I think this is an opportunity where we can expand the study, not step on the toes of the status of women committee and actually have a broad study.
Now that we don't have any legislation in front of us—thank goodness—we can actually do a more thorough job of getting to the bottom of this by giving opportunities for witness lists and really digging down into the problems with sport.
I'll cede the floor because I see other hands up. We'll go from there.