Canadian Heritage Committee on March 27th, 2023

[Robert Hedges]

Specifically, we separate ourselves from the actual investigation. We have an arm with Western Law called Sport Solutions. If an athlete comes to us specifically with any sort of complaint whether it's, say, with sport, athlete agreements, the selection process, we advise them to go to that. They get consultation from lawyers there on what they should do, whether it should go through OSIC, whether it should go through the SDRCC complaint mechanism, whether it should go to criminal investigation. That is the way we filter the athletes.

Outside that, in terms of advocating, we need a safe mechanism. As has been alluded to, when NSOs in the past were able to self-police themselves or complaints came back to the HPD, and then they would just bury things, those things cannot happen moving forward. We need a system in place where reporting can happen and athletes, again, can feel safe reporting, and where action is taken from their complaints.

[Robert Gordon Kitchen, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Expanding upon that, then, if you're dealing with a complaint that's come your way along the lines of a coach or a trainer, or whatever, how do you as an organization specifically deal with those aspects?

[Robert Hedges]

How it works with us is an athlete will come to us and say that they have been having this issue, so we will talk to them, obviously, and then see where that's at. If they want to write a letter of complaint, we potentially could help them write that letter to their NSO, if that's the work that they want to do. If they are looking to take more formal action, then we steer them towards Sport Solution, which is a branch of Western Law, and they then get actual legal consultation, because we don't provide that.

[Robert Gordon Kitchen, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Do you have steps to sanction the coaches and the trainers that you could put in place? Are there avenues for you to address that?

[Robert Hedges]

No, we don't have any of those powers.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you, Robert. Your time is up.

Thanks very much.

I want to go to the final questioner, and that's Anthony Housefather for the Liberals.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

I'm going to do it, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Go ahead, Michael.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you so much.

Again, I want to thank the witnesses for their testimony today.

I want to go back to Mr. Ross.

You brought up racism as an issue when we're speaking about safe sport. Throughout our conversations with many individuals, this issue has not come up often. When you read through the papers and watch the headlines, you can see that this issue is something that not only impacts sports like hockey; it's right across the board.

I want to ask you from your perspective a little bit about why racism isn't being identified in mainstream conversations like this as an issue that needs to be included in the discussion around safety in sport or safe sport in general. Do you have any thoughts?

[Dr. MacIntosh Ross]

You're absolutely right. For some reason, we do kind of put racism in its own compartment away from safe sport. I'm not entirely certain why that happens, but in my gut I think it continues to come down to the power of white, predominantly male administrators within the sport system.

It's the exact thing that Akim Aliu was talking about, trying to find opportunities to make sure that there is room for diverse populations within ice hockey, for example, but also all sports in Canada. When he brought that forward to the GTHL, they said that it was impossible. They also said they weren't racist, and then they had to basically sanction one of their own for being racist in a meeting immediately after that decision was made.

I think it's something that people are still relatively uncomfortable talking about, but we see it all across the board. Despite the calls to action in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, we're not seeing the kind of commitment to indigenous kids that we need to see. Down by me, there are still reserves that don't have clean drinking water. If you don't have clean drinking water, how can you have a robust sport system? That's not possible.

I'm sorry; I'm kind of at a loss for words, because we've been talking about this in academia for years, for decades. It doesn't seem that people want to take these really meaningful actions, the kinds of things Akim Aliu suggested that can make a change and can ensure that change happens. They want policies. They want to talk about it, and they want to move on, but that doesn't create change.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

I noticed that recently Nova Scotia put forward an anti-racism strategy for sport within the province. There are these big jurisdictional challenges and, of course, different sports. We talked about the divide between public education and the provincial sport organizations.

How do we navigate these big challenges of all these different sections within sports that may not have the same language? They may not work well with each other because of those divides. How do we position that through some type of an inquiry, if it did go forward, to ensure that we can get the best possible recommendations federally while at the same time respecting those divides that may exist like the provincial divides? Do you have any thoughts on that as someone who's involved in academia?

[Dr. MacIntosh Ross]

I come back every time to the idea of collaborative federalism and how well it has worked for the sport system in terms of people working together from the provinces and the federal government, or Sport Canada and the provincial associations to pursue excellence in sport. Part of the reason that worked so well, as Wendy was saying, is that it uses different lenses to examine things. Once we look at things in the Nova Scotian context and we understand it that way, we can start to make changes there that are going to benefit not just the province, but all of the provinces and the nation together.

That being said, I think any kind of inquiry needs to be integrated that way. I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility. Yes, it will cost a lot of money, but we spent a lot of money getting ourselves into this problem. We've pursued excellence and dumped millions and millions of dollars into it. If we have to have a large joint inquiry that incorporates both the federal government and the provinces, I don't think it should be something that we shy away from.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you.

That brings an end to our meeting for today.

I want to thank our witnesses.

Three of you are survivors. One of you is an advocate. I want to say how much courage it takes for you to come here and stand up with the stigma and the trauma that you've faced, as well as the backlash that you still face, being whistle-blowers—and being survivors.

I want you to know that you speak for so many people who are still hiding in the shadows and who are incapable, for various reasons, of coming out here themselves.

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear!

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Your testimony is very moving. I feel comfortable speaking for everyone on this committee in saying that we are going to do everything that we can to address this systemic, bitter problem that we see and that we place our children in.

Thank you very much.

The meeting is now adjourned.