Thanks for that great question.
We actually had three pilots ongoing. The first was a medical pilot, with a trial in B.C. We wanted to reduce the number of medical doctors and physicians needed in the recruiting system. We ran a pilot, and it was successful. We paid a number of doctors in the Vancouver area to conduct the medicals for us.
I would only challenge the idea or notion that you can have your own doctor do it. We want to make sure a third independent party has a chance to look at you, versus your family doctor, to ensure that it's open, honest, and transparent.
We've done the pilot. We're looking at rolling the pilot across the country, where we have civilian doctors who have had some form of training from us and know exactly what they're looking for to speed up the process. That piece is actually done.
The second one was on the issue of fitness, which you didn't touch on. We removed fitness testing from the Canadian Forces recruiting system. I don't know if you were aware of that. We reduced fitness testing. We instead established a fitness company at Saint-Jean. You now arrive at Saint-Jean and do your fitness test on day one. If you pass, you continue with the training. If you don't pass, we make you become fit. We took an old drill hall at Saint-Jean and put in physical fitness training equipment. We have physical trainers.
Last year, because of that approach, we selected 550 Canadians who would otherwise not have been selected. We made them fit. Originally, the idea was that it would take 90 days. Most now leave after 30 days. It has been another way to speed up the process and bring in more people.
The third is the security piece. We are actually partnered with BackCheck. BackCheck does some of that security piece for us. It's a Canadian company. We looked at that. I personally looked at it in the early days to ensure it was a Canadian company. It does some security screening for us. As you mentioned, it can't do everything to ensure that those who have a C7 rifle or ammunition are people who can use it responsibly, but it has helped to speed up the system.
We've done the three pilots. The fitness one has now been training for one year. We're continuing, as you've seen. We've only had one individual join the Canadian Forces to be part of the fitness company and then quit right after. It has been a huge success in the end. It's the same for the BackCheck security work, which has sped up the process to 48 hours. Many companies use BackCheck. The last one is the medical pilot, which we're going to roll out across the country.
