National Defence Committee on Nov. 15th, 2016

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

I want to move on to Operation Unifier in Ukraine. Again, our troops are doing great work there in training and assisting the Ukrainian forces to deal with Russian aggression.

That agreement with that training program comes to an end in March 2017. What's going to happen after that? Do you expect it to be renewed, extended, or are we bringing our guys home?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

I will bring forward options for the government to decide, to consider the way ahead after that. Right now there are no plans for the mission to come to an end.

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

I appreciate that.

On NATO reassurance measures, we're going to be commanding the battalion in Latvia. What is the timeline of getting that up and running? Can you give us a little detail as to who our partners are, what they are going to be doing, and what we're going to be doing in this coalition?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

We would intend to have everybody deployed in June or July of 2017, with the battle group we would consider operationally capable later, in September or October.

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

And we'll be going over with all the military kit we need to do the job that we're being asked to do?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

Yes, sir.

We are the nucleus of the command and control in the various enabling functions of the battle group. We are also providing a LAV-equipped rifle company in the battle group.

They've announced our partners: Poland and Italy, with Slovenia providing a small part, and together the battle group rounds out. Other nations are considering joining, Albania certainly.

The battle group will round out with our 450 to 455 people and should come in just under 1,000 and it can be augmented by other NATO assets should it be required for exercises, training, and operations.

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

I'll be very quick.

In your opening comments on the potential African missions under UN command you said you're going to maintain some control. Of course that's been a concern of the official opposition. Who is in command of our troops and how do we prevent what happened in Rwanda repeating itself?

We heard this in our defence policy review consultations as our veterans and some of your predecessors have been quite vocal about putting Canadian troops under UN command again.

How are we going to mitigate the problems with the much lighter bureaucracy within the United Nations with keeping our troops safe, as well as allowing them to do the job we're sending them there to do?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

That's a great question. I've answered this for the Senate committee as well.

I never relinquish national command of our troops. In so doing I will put in place the command and control capacity and the leadership to ensure I can exercise that command. That command allows us to take actions, extraordinary or otherwise, to ensure the safety and effectiveness of our troops in operations.

I think perhaps in the translation, some might have come out as perhaps an inappropriate way of describing it. It is true that the forces there will respond to UN tasks to do things, which is perfectly legitimate, and this is on any sort of generic operation. You allow your forces to be tasked by a chain of command, but at all times you understand what those taskings are. We can assure ourselves that those taskings are valid and legitimate, and will aid the mission overall.

As for our ability to protect ourselves, we've learned a lot since Rwanda, and I will make certain that the troops have the rules of engagement they need to be able to defend themselves and those they work with. They'll have the rules of engagement they need in a chapter VII operation—if it is a chapter VII operation—to be able to effectively contribute to that mission to the extent that we decide, as a country, to contribute.

We will take steps that have been learned in the last 15 years about how to best manage operations, be it from a medical service support or theatre management level. This we will do on any deployed force, and we do that now.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Thank you very much for that.

Ms. Romanado, you have the floor.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Thank you, General, for being here today. It's a real pleasure to see you again.

I'd like to start my comments on something my colleague Mr. Garrison started. He has been a huge supporter of me and my two sons who are currently serving and the families.

As you know, my older son lost some classmates this year at RMC. I have been in contact with some of the families affected by this. I know we recently announced the SSAV that's now under way at RMC.

Could you provide us with an update on that initiative? I'm not sure you're able to at this early stage.

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

Thank you for your question, and thank you for your sons' service.

The question of why, or whether, to launch a senior staff assistance visit to RMC was one that I brought to the minister, We discussed it, and we moved ahead on it. I ordered it because there were a sufficient number of irregularities that happened in a relatively small student population. As a commander...and this is a premium institution for education and training, and it is the principal avenue by which we turn highly motivated young Canadians into great officers in the armed forces. We don't want anything to go wrong there.

Perhaps I was over-sensitive to that fact, given my concern with how we treat people, with Operation Honour, and with concerns about suicide, mental health, and the excellence of our institution. When I saw enough irregularities, I decided that we needed to act. I brought that to the minister. He absolutely concurred, and here we are.

I don't believe that at this juncture we're going to find anything really dramatic. I need to make certain that the Royal Military College continues to be a good unit in the Canadian Armed Forces, as it has been, and that the environment is appropriate for turning out young Canadians into officers. It's an institution that does a lot of things, but it does them all together to turn out educated young men and women as officers in the Canadian Armed Forces. We can't lose sight of that. It's not just a university. It's not just a unit. It does a lot of things. I had to make certain that it's working.

We had a recent spate of suicides, which will undergo their own investigations with boards of inquiry, and as we find those details out, those details will come to me, and I will put it all together in a mosaic of what we will discover about the Royal Military College. Like any institution in the armed forces, I want it to be superb in every respect. This particular staff assistance visit is to help us find out why there may be some challenges there, if there are.

I don't have anything. They haven't reported back to me. I'm not seeking any interim reports to say something that we would have to act on quickly to preserve the institution as we think it needs to be. I think this will be longer term, and probably in the range of effective investment and effective selection of leadership at all levels. It needs reaffirmation of its purpose to make certain that it remains an institution of excellence on the university scene in Canada, but also as a unit in the armed forces.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

I thank you on behalf of the military families for doing this.

I'm going to switch gears a little. We visited NORAD in the spring, and we met with Admiral Gortney who was talking to us a bit about a possible binational C2 command structure with multi-domain capabilities. I can't know what's going to happen to our friends south of the border now that there's been a change in government.

What are your thoughts on this possible route?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

To tell you the truth, we already have it. We are a binational command structure. NORAD, I think, is 58 and going on 59 years old, and is our oldest permanent alliance. It is unique in the world. It's binational. Canada and the United States both own it.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

General, is it true that we don't have—

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

I'm afraid we'll have to move on.

[Sherry Romanado, Liberal, Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC]

Maybe I'll get another shot.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Sorry about that.

Mr. Garrison, you have the floor.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Thank you very much.

I want to turn to questions related to budget. I'm not asking you to get into the budget. At current funding levels, what we've seen is several studies that have estimated there's a very large amount of deferred maintenance in the military, and it appears that because of budget limitations, things that we need to maintain our capacities haven't been done as regularly as they should have been done.

I'm worried that's going to lead to some capability gaps. We have, I guess they call it a capital deficit not just on new equipment, but on the bases and facilities, such as in my riding, where we have some very old buildings with asbestos that need to be replaced.

My question comes back, without asking you to speculate on budget, do you see this problem of deferred maintenance and facilities as affecting our capabilities going forward?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

I think the short answer to your question is absolutely. We've already experienced it once with the inability to put to sea a ship that can support our navy. Whether it is in deferred maintenance or in deferred capital, I take your point that we absolutely want to make certain that we don't defer maintenance and that we don't take risks with our operational capability into the future, particularly with those things that we are fundamentally relying upon.

I take your point as well about infrastructure. Infrastructure can sometimes fuel the challenges of deferred investment. I don't know what the number is, but there is a sort of old standard for what you need to reinvest in recapitalizing your infrastructure, and we have an ambition to try to achieve it.

Some good things have been done about this. We have put under the stewardship of our assistant deputy minister for infrastructure and environment the management of our estate. I think this will go a long way toward making it more efficient and effective and keeping the funds flowing.

As it relates to capability by capability, platform by platform, I concur: we need to be very cautious when we defer investment in required maintenance, so as to not lose capability. Generally speaking, we do not. My experience has been, certainly since I've been CDS, that it's on our mind, and we seek to invest appropriately to ensure that we don't lose the capabilities we have.

[Randall Garrison, NDP, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

I guess I've expressed my concern before that the shipbuilding strategy has slipped from being a floor to being a ceiling. When it was originally put forward it specified the minimum capabilities we needed; now it's come to be considered as the maximum we could possibly get.

Do you have a brief comment on what's happening with the attitude towards our shipbuilding strategy?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

The way we've approached shipbuilding has identified the basic requirement of the Canadian Armed Forces in the Royal Canadian Navy to achieve the tasks that are before them. As I've said many times, depending on the spending level that is ultimately decided concerning how many ships will be produced, I am convinced that not only will it match the policy basis for what we would do with those ships and the reason we need them, but that if we need more because the country needs us to do more, we would, I'm certain, have more.

I would say it's probably premature right now. The program is in its early phases. I know the commander of the Royal Canadian Navy and others have spoken on this extensively. I think we need to see how it goes when we get into the build of the CSC.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Thank you.

That ends the formal rounds of questioning.

We have about nine minutes left. I'd like to give each party a two-minute or less question and an answer. I believe there's a motion that the Liberals want to put on the floor at some point before the time ends.

Having said that, I'll give the floor to Ms. Gallant for a two-minute question and response, please.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

The Globe and Mail has recently put forth a series called “The Unremembered”, which profiles soldiers who've died as a consequence of suicide. One issue that has been raised around this is that there is a break in care between the medical release.... When they're medically released, they don't get continuity of care. The military ombudsman has recommended that the benefits and care be in place prior to release of the soldier.

Do you see how important that is?

[Gen Jonathan Vance]

I do.

[Cheryl Gallant, Conservative, Renfrew—Nipissing—Pembroke, ON]

With that, Mr. Chairman, I would like to move:

That the government of Canada immediately begin to take the measures necessary for the full implementation and of all the recommendations in the two reports of the National Defence and Canadian Forces ombudsman tabled in 2016; that the Government implement all of these recommendations as a best way forward to support the Canadian Armed Forces members and veterans, particularly those in transition; and that the Office of Military Ombudsman provide progress reports to the Committee on a monthly basis.