National Defence Committee on Feb. 9th, 2017

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

We manage the budget in two ways. We estimate an average of 17 days of training for each individual, but on top of that, we also plan quite robust regional and national-level exercises or training events that will draw in folks from multiple units. In other words, there's training at the unit level that we budget for, the 17 days, but then there are a significant number of events above and beyond that, which people can volunteer for in order to keep up their readiness levels.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

On average, how many days does a Class A reservist have per year in a unit?

My question is about the winter training program only, because I know that, during the summer, reservists may be in Class B.

For a Class A reservist, what's your budget on average?

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

I will look to my deputy or chief to see if they know an average number of days.

[Capt(N) Chris Ross]

In the naval reserve division, the average number of days spent is 17 full days.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

That's all?

[Capt(N) Chris Ross]

However, added to that are the events outside the naval reserve division itself, and it is up to the member himself or herself to say, “I want to go on that weekend; I want to go to sea there; I want to participate in that exercise.” Those are in addition to the actual days spent inside the naval reserve division. All those components will go toward enhancing a member's individual level of readiness, which obviously we will track as well.

[Pierre Paul-Hus, Conservative, Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles, QC]

Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

Mr. Paul-Hus, that's all the time you have.

I'm going to give the floor over to Mr. McDonald. Welcome to the defence committee. You have the floor.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I have a couple of quick questions, and I'll share any time left over with my colleague, as I think Leona has a couple of questions.

Commodore, you mentioned retention and attrition. People are not staying and people leaving, and you're not attracting the numbers you would like.

Do you find that the numbers are proportionally the same across the country when it comes to retention? As well, with not being able to attract, where were your numbers before? Were they higher than now? Are you seeing a shift where everything is going in one direction but proportionally it's still staying pretty much the same in regard to enrolment and retention and people leaving?

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

That is exactly what we would like our current retention working groups to start to tease out for us. Are there regional differences? Is there a change in the—if I can put it this way—life patterns? Are people staying in longer or leaving earlier in higher numbers? That's exactly the type of analysis we're hoping to have in the coming months to better understand the situation and then to develop better strategies to retain more people.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you.

Captain Ross, you were talking about the enrolment process and the 21 days if somebody young walked in. I know the commodore mentioned somebody, a Red Seal cook, but if somebody walked in to sign up to join the reserve—say a fully trained Red Seal electrician, a plumber, or whatever—would the process be any different? To attract fully trained tradespeople, what would they start at, or would they have to be retrained to some degree?

[Capt(N) Chris Ross]

The difference there is that when we say that all of our trades are part of the same as what's in the regular force, all the regular force trades are not part of the naval reserve. They have technical trades that we wouldn't have.

For a lot of those people who are skilled technicians, the electronics techs, we would try to convince them to have a career in the regular force. We wouldn't recruit them directly into the naval reserve. For anybody who comes in, obviously there is specific training that's required, basic recruit training, and everybody will have to go through that process. Some training can be.... We call it PLA, previous learning assessment, but predominantly they go through the naval training system.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

I wasn't thinking of somebody who was looking to join the full-time armed forces or navy or whatever. It was the 28- or 29-year-old who's working at his trade now and would like to explore something different. He would still work at what he's trained to do, but use that expertise in the reserves.

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

We do have recruits who are coming in, and we talk predominantly about students, but in fact we are recruiting folks who are beyond their student years. Folks like that would still have to go through the basic training process and occupational training, because that's what they would need to be employed at sea in whatever occupation they would choose. We do see more and more people who do that, and they can perhaps do all of their training within one year and be ready to be employed at sea after that.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Commodore, do you think the levels of compensation for your reservists are at levels that should be able to keep the retention rates up high, or is that something that you'd look at as being a component to entice people to stay or entice people to actually join the reserves?

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

I think overall that is exactly the type of question that's being examined through the compensation and benefits review overall. Certainly for a part-time job, the benefits in particular that are offered through the reserve employment of any reserve are really substantial and an attraction for some folks who want to join.

[Ken McDonald, Liberal, Avalon, NL]

Thank you. I'll pass it to Leona.

[The Chair, Liberal, Stephen Fuhr]

There's very little time left. Actually, there is no time left.

I think we're going to have some time to go around the block another time after this, but just to get the formal questions out of the way, I'm going to give the last formal question to Ms. Blaney.

You have the floor.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

I'm going to go a little bit in a different direction.

In 2008 the ombudsman recommended to the Canadian Armed Forces that periodic health assessments be made available to regular and reserve force members on an equal basis. In 2011 the surgeon general agreed that it should happen, and then in 2015, in the report on the feasibility of providing periodic health assessments to all primary reservists, the ombudsman reiterated this need, and it's still not happening. Can you tell us why that's the case?

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

I think it is definitely a great initiative to be able to ensure that the part-time reservists are able to have the periodic assessments done as well. There was an initiative under way within the health services that was meant to be rolled out very soon, but I'm not sure of the status of it at this time. I actually would recommend that this question be brought to the head of the Canadian Forces health services.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Thank you.

Do you agree with the ombudsman that policies are needed to bring medical care to reservists, especially to part-time reservists?

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

I think that's an interesting question. That's the type of question that has to have a lot of analysis, which I certainly don't have knowledge of, and it may well be part of the compensation and benefits review. I'm not sure.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

I also want to ask a couple of questions about the naval reserves reorganization.

Could you tell us a bit about the goal of the restructuring of the naval reserves and realigning that toward the traditional CAF model of reserve service?

[Cmdre Marta B. Mulkins]

Yes. That's fundamentally what the establishment review is all about.

In order for us to be able to generate sailors to be augmenting in ships, there needs to be a whole structure put around that, both in order to generate enough sailors at any given time to meet the augment target of 10% across the fleet and also to have all of the apparatus around that to make sure that naval reserve units can operate, that naval reserve headquarters can operate, that careers can be managed, and that training can be delivered. Those all factor into the equation of what that structure will be.

There are two sides to it. There's the structure, which is what I was just speaking of, and there are also the processes—the governance—within the broader navy to ensure that there is sufficient training capacity year in, year out, and that there are sufficient employment opportunities year in, year out as well. All of those things are under way right now. They're coming together this year, in fact.

[Rachel Blaney, NDP, North Island—Powell River, BC]

Okay.

In your view, should the naval reserve retain certain specific maritime defence responsibilities?