National Defence Committee on May 21st, 2021

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I think we're still waiting for the opposition to respond on a couple of items. It would be only fair to hear from them before we were to vote on them.

One is the proposal I made last week, to get to the report. As Mr. Spengemann just said, it's so important to get to the report and stop this stalling with inappropriate motions by Mr. Bezan.

The proposal I had made was that we use Mr. Bezan's process to go through all the recommendations and see which ones we could unanimously agree to, which we will use Mr. Bezan's process on and get those done. They would be done relatively quickly. We would have a substantive report that would help the survivors, that would give the defence department and the minister direction, and, if my amendment passes, they would have to respond to that.

Then, we would continue and deal with those items that, as in any committee, we're not fully in agreement on and have those hard discussions. I haven't heard any negative feedback from the opposition on that proposal, but we'll wait to see what their thoughts are on getting to the report right away.

The other item that we're waiting to hear from the NDP and the Bloc on is this amendment. It's as if they think that the government shouldn't respond. We don't know that, and I think it would be unfair to go to a vote.

I have to apologize for making this motion without their knowing in advance. If we have to wait until the next meeting for them to think it out, that's fine. I understand that.

A government agenda is tremendously complicated. No matter who's in government, there are all sorts of things lined up to get on the order table, to get done by committees. I think Madam Vandenbeld earlier today explained all the things related to the defence of Canada that are waiting in line on our committee. This is the one time when we have the leadership at CAF and the leadership in the minister's office.... We have a slot in time where we could actually make a difference.

Through my previous suggestion, or another way, and through this amendment, hopefully we could get to a report right away. The opposition could stop making that not possible. We could go to the report right away and come up with some substantive things to help survivors and make the department a much better place to work.

I, too, have to respond to what Mr. Bezan said. First of all, the purpose of Standing Order 109 is to give the government time. As many members have mentioned, and I've certainly mentioned, these are serious, very in-depth, complicated recommendations in which any government that's thoughtful would take the time to go over, analyze and come up with a response—not in a few minutes after a surprise concurrence motion is called.

I think it's very important to ask the government to think out and make a response so that we know, and that the survivors know that what they've said, and what the government is responding, shows they're being taken seriously.

I agree with Mr. Spengemann. I thought it was shameful that Mr. Bezan suggested that hearing the witness statements was not the most important item, that it was not critical. Obviously, we have a difference of philosophies here. What's to be emphasized in this report, or what's the most important part, from my perspective, and I think from some of my colleagues', is the survivors and the experts providing suggestions as to how we deal with the systemic problem that's affecting thousands of members of the CAF.

Mr. Bezan seems to think the emphasis should be on the problem with General Vance. The problem with Mr. Bezan's.... That's his right. He wants to concentrate on General Vance's problems, but what he hasn't done is admitted that what the evidence has shown is that the most serious problem with Mr. Vance was at his appointment.

We found out that there were two serious.... First of all, before that, in 2018, there was an anonymous email. The person didn't want to be identified, so nothing could come out of it. It was investigated within 24 hours as much as it could have been. The information was kept confidential, as the member of the CAF wanted, so that was totally taken care of.

There were many witnesses called about that anonymous email, which they couldn't say anything about or didn't know what was in it. We spent all that time on that in many meetings. I believe the survivors would really not think we were taking the survivors' situations and the situation in the military seriously if—

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you, Mr. Bagnell.

I feel really bad for having to interrupt you, but the bells are ringing for a vote.

This meeting is suspended.

[The meeting was suspended at 12:48 p.m., Monday, June 7]

[The meeting resumed at 1:06 p.m., Friday, June 11

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

I call this meeting back into order.

Good afternoon and welcome, everyone.

This is a resumption of meeting number 32 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on National Defence, which started on Friday, May 21, 2021.

Please, if interpretation is lost, let us know immediately so that everyone has the opportunity to fully participate in the proceedings.

I will remind you that all comments by members should be addressed through the chair.

When speaking, again as a reminder to me as well as anybody else, please speak slowly and clearly. Our interpreters have been doing yeoman service, and we're asking an awful lot of them, so please do your very best to speak slowly and clearly, and give them a break because we all have a busy couple of weeks ahead of us and we're relying on them very heavily. Please be kind to our interpreters.

With regard to a speaking list, the clerk and I will do the best we can to maintain a consolidated order of speaking whether you're participating virtually or in person.

We are resuming debate on Mr. Bagnell's amendment to Mr. Bezan's motion.

Mr. Bagnell has the floor.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

At the last meeting we heard a shocking revelation that had just come in that committee meeting, and it was that a member of our committee, during this study that we're doing on sexual misconduct in the military, did not think the committee should be hearing testimony that had been given by victims.

To not hear testimony given by victims, that's incomprehensible.

I'm sure there are other committee members who were just as shocked as I was about not reviewing testimony given by witnesses. What could be more important on this study? I could just imagine what some victims might be feeling when their testimony was being read at committee, and a committee member said, that's not what we should be discussing. It was just not any committee member; it was a senior member.

I think that really provides a stark divide between committee members.

As I have said so many times, and I believe there are other members who feel the same way, we should be taking the testimony of victims and experts and recommending solutions. Not reviewing and using the testimony of victims in designing a report is incomprehensible.

I wonder what brave victims who came forward think when they are told we shouldn't be using their testimony and we should spend weeks upon weeks of our time on an anonymous email that no one was allowed to see, while actually we have real victims—

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

I have a point of order.

I just think, about this rant by Mr. Bagnell, that he's been somewhat chastised for using witness testimony for his political gain. What I said is that we shouldn't be using witness testimony to filibuster. We shouldn't be using witness testimony without the permission of those witnesses. For him to say anything other than that is disingenuous.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you, Mr. Bezan.

Carry on, Mr. Bagnell, please.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you.

The member's just emphasizing the point of our not using that testimony—

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

Not for your grandstanding, no.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

We actually have real live victims who had the courage to tell their stories.

Regarding the email we're talking about, its existence was referred to investigators in 24 hours and dealt with, but no, we have to call witness after witness to discuss this anonymous email, which no one knew what was in it, and hear the testimony of witnesses, and we must call back witnesses who have already appeared for three to six hours to talk about that email. What are we doing as a committee?

There was a debate in the House on Wednesday night on GBA+. Frankly, I was proud of a number of the members from different parties who spoke constructively. Fortunately, the member from our committee who just spoke, who does not think evidence put on the record by victims should be considered, was not supported by speeches of the members in the House.

The Conservative member for Calgary Skyview talked about survivors. I'll just quote some of the things she said.

She said, “When that individual made an appearance before the committee, she mentioned how”, and went on to talk about what she heard. She also said, “We heard from another witness who had reported an incident”, and she went on to describe it.

She said:

So many witnesses, women in particular, came forward to our committee to express this lack of confidence.... We even had a witness who gave a very interesting perspective on the double standards that the military justice system has towards women and men.

The Conservative member went on:

This witness discussed how, when she was deployed in Afghanistan, an investigation had been conducted into a consensual relationship she had had with a U.S. officer, who was not in her unit but of the same rank. She admitted that the relationship was against the regulations, and she pleaded guilty to the charges. She was fined, repatriated from the theatre and posted out of her unit. She accepted this as her punishment.

However, as a result, she was called demeaning names and was told that she was not worthy of leading soldiers. She said that she was also threatened with violence by a commanding officer and was repeatedly chastised by other officers. She was sent to work alone in an office managing a single Excel spreadsheet, and it quickly became very clear...that her career in the Canadian Armed Forces was over. When she left the military, she had originally been given an offer to go into the reserves, but that was revoked when the commanding officer told her that she was not the type of leader he wanted in his unit.

She said the biggest failure in her life were the actions for which she was pushed out of the armoured corps, and for that she continues to carry immense shame.

Obviously that Conservative member thinks testimony of witnesses is very important.

Two days ago Wednesday night, the NDP member Ms. Mathyssen referred to the testimony at the status of women committee.

She said Lieutenant-Colonel Eleanor Taylor said, “Throughout my career, I have observed insidious and inappropriate use of power for sexual exploitation.”

She said Christine Wood said, “I feel like women have never had a level playing field in the [armed] forces”.

Ms. Mathyssen also talked about the culture as what we need to address with recommendations. That's exactly what the Liberals for the last few weeks have been saying at this committee, giving evidence and information related to the culture.

The Conservative member from Calgary Midnapore also referred to evidence from the victims, witnesses at the status of women committee.

Therefore, there was much reference to witnesses, and as I said, some very constructive discussion.

In fairness to Mr. Bezan, there is a part of our study on sexual misconduct in the military that refers to General Vance. Given that there are thousands of incidents, victims and perpetrators, my emphasis would not be on that one anonymous email that no one knows what was in, but that's Mr. Bezan's choice, which he's entitled to.

If he wants to concentrate on General Vance, and as I've said, I don't want to, then he has to be honest about the facts and evidence that have been revealed recently, where it is shown that the major issue related to General Vance was his appointment in 2015. I can understand how that would be difficult for him, but the facts are facts. I won't go into the details on all those facts right now, but just give a summary.

At the time of the appointment, Mr. O'Toole passed on, through his staff, I believe, a rumour to PM Harper's chief of staff related to General Vance's alleged conduct at NATO in Naples.

In tribute to Mr. Garrison, actually, I think he asked some of the best questions of Mr. Novak. I'm not sure if he got all the answers he wanted, but that was just the tip of the iceberg as seen from the information that's come out since.

There was a hurried investigation, which was concluded the day General Vance took over command. Apparently, an access to information request, which I assume came from the press, said they felt under pressure to complete the investigation. I'm not sure what led to that pressure, but depending on what it was, it might have been a very serious offence.

Then there was a second rumour about inappropriate action at Gagetown. Apparently, the request was put forward to the national security adviser to investigate. I think it was that one. He neither remembers the request nor certainly did he do an investigation. There's obviously a lot more to be seen here in 2015 than an anonymous email in 2018 that no one could see, and its existence was reported within 24 hours and acted on as far as possible.

If any committee member, rather than listening to the testimony that had been recorded by victims and experts in efforts to come up with solutions for them to help the victims improve the military, would rather deal with General Vance, then the facts show that the most serious questions about who, where, why and when are at the Conservative appointment of General Vance. With these rumours and unaccomplished, incomplete investigations, why was he appointed?

Two nights ago, on Wednesday night, during the debate in the House, the Bloc member raised this issue of the Conservative appointment. I will read from Hansard:

Members should recall that the Conservatives had already caught wind of allegations against General Vance. However, they still appointed him as chief of the defence staff even though the Canadian Armed Forces had just been roundly criticized for their management of sexual misconduct cases and pervasive sexist culture.

Certainly, there is enough evidence that I've already outlined that any further discussions regarding General Vance should be concentrated on his appointment in 2015 in spite of uninvestigated rumours at the time. For any committee member who still wishes to concentrate on General Vance, on June 1, the Ottawa Citizen reported on their uncovering even more related to General Vance's appointment. Let me quote some of that:

Military police investigating allegations of an inappropriate relationship by Gen. Jon Vance in 2015 never interviewed the senior officer, but did consult the satirical Frank magazine for information.

The police investigation was hurriedly done just weeks before Vance was to take on the top military job as chief of the defence staff.

It was hurriedly done. Is that a good way to start an appointment?

The article continues:

The Canadian Forces National Investigation Service probe took just four weeks to wrap up, concluding there was no “physical evidence” Vance had a relationship contrary to military regulations, according to documents obtained by this newspaper.

Vance was never interviewed for the investigation and police relied on a statement he provided a year earlier on the same allegation. In addition, a formal investigation plan was never created by the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service for the 2015 probe, according to the records.

A formal investigation plan was never created, although a member of this committee has said that the appropriate investigation was done.

The article continues:

The investigation service, also known as the CFNIS, was called in after Lt.-Gen. Christine Whitecross received an anonymous email on June 10, 2015, claiming Vance was involved in sexual misconduct while he was posted to NATO as deputy commander allied joint force command in Naples. The claim centred around Vance’s 2014 relationship with a subordinate U.S. female officer, whom he eventually married.

The CFNIS was to determine if Vance followed military directives governing personal and romantic relationships between personnel.

“No direct witnesses were found by any of our sources of information relating to a physical act,” stated the CFNIS investigation, although it did conclude Vance indeed had a personal relationship at the time with the U.S. officer.

The CFNIS tried to contact the anonymous source who claimed they could provide names of military staff who knew about Vance's relationship in Naples, but the police received no response.

There are still lots unanswered questions.

Vance in his previous statement denied any wrongdoing.

Investigators also reviewed an April 2015 article in the satirical magazine, Frank, which outlined allegations about Vance during his time in NATO. The article was titled, “Humour in Uniform”....

But police later determined—

Although it didn't have an affect at the time on the Naples headquarters police....

—that, “Given time, this personal relationship would likely have had a detrimental effect.”

Why would you appoint someone under those conditions?

In addition, the investigation examined concerns about Vance's statement to the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff Lt.Gen. Guy Thibault. Vance had claimed he had no command relationship with the U.S. officer. “Though the statement by LGen Vance was technically correct, there would also likely have been times that LGen Vance was in Comd of (the U.S. officer)....

Several months before the CFNIS probe, then Prime Minister Stephen Harper raised the issue of the relationship in Naples when he met with Vance. At the time, Harper was considering the general for the...job.

Later, the Conservative government raised concerns about a rumour circulating that Vance, while at CFB Gagetown in New Brunswick allegedly had an inappropriate relationship with a female subordinate....

In early 2001, the CFNIS launched a new investigation after Maj. Kellie Brennan told Global News she had a long-term relationship with Vance that started at CFB Gagetown and continued in Toronto in 2006—

This was nine years before the Conservatives appointed him.

—when the general was her superior officer. Vance has not responded to repeated requests for comment from this newspaper....

It's obvious that, for anyone who wants to study anything more about General Vance, it is about his appointment in 2015. We can continue to debate the totally unreasonable and inappropriate motion before us, or we can withdraw the motion to simply get on to learning from victims and witnesses and discussing, without unreasonable time limits, recommendations that we can all agree on to improve the lives of the brave men and women in the Canadian military.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much, Mr. Bagnell.

Mr. Robillard, the floor is yours.

[Yves Robillard, Liberal, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to start by recalling how important Mr. Bagnell's motion is and to thank him for it.

I actually feel that it is a compromise that would allow us to do our work properly. Clearly, two minutes are not enough to understand the complex and difficult situation that members of the Canadian Armed Forces are experiencing. Is two minutes all the time that we have or that we can give the victims, the survivors? That's ridiculous. Not asking for a response from the government is equally ridiculous.

I would now like to quote from the article by Professor Maya Eichler about Operation HONOUR. It highlights the importance of taking time to deal with this problem.

Militaries have long relied on particular notions of femininity and masculinity, such as women in need of protection, men as protectors and women as patriotic mothers. While the warrior has endured as “a key symbol of masculinity”, women’s and men’s roles in war are not static. Women’s presence in Western militaries has significantly expanded over the past four decades. Women’s greater participation in militaries is an outcome of political and social changes. In particular, it is related to the shift from conscription to volunteer forces, the advocacy of the women’s movement, the changing nature of warfare, and more recently, international gender mainstreaming instruments, such as UNSCR 1325 on Women, Peace and Security. Notwithstanding women’s increased military participation, feminist scholarship shows that many Western militaries have retained the characteristics of male-dominated organizations. They privilege masculinity, and marginalize women and values associated with femininity. Not all women have negative experiences in the military and many women have fulfilling military careers. However, militaries remain crucial sites for the (re)production of gender inequalities. Women in Western militaries are still concentrated in support functions, performing administrative and clerical work. In almost all militaries, combat remains an exclusively male sphere, if not legally then in practice, and combat has been a particularly contested area of struggle around women’s integration. Militaries can therefore be seen as highly invested in “defining and policing the boundaries of women’s service”. In a recent article, Claire Duncanson and Rachel Woodward explored the question of how militaries can be “regendered” in ways that challenge their unequal gender order. They go beyond earlier feminist debates that focused on either advocating for women's right to fight or opposing women's cooptation into militarism. Instead they argue that we need to consider the possibilities of transforming gendered military cultures. In this article, I use the insights of critical feminist international relations to explore this Canadian issue by tracing the shifts in the Canadian military's approach to gender over the past three decades and examining the potential and limitations of Operation HONOUR.

I will come back to this a little later.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much, Mr. Robillard.

We move on to Mr. Spengemann, please.

[Sven Spengemann, Liberal, Mississauga—Lakeshore, ON]

Madam Chair, thank you very much. I would like to welcome colleagues to the discussion this afternoon, and thank my colleagues for their earlier intervention so far.

At the outset, Madam Chair, you reminded us that this meeting has been in session since May 21, some 20 days. We've had very fulsome discussions, debate, not necessarily progress, but certainly debate about how important the issues are before the committee, and how they should be tackled. I think it's incredibly important to keep in mind that testimony is at the forefront of the committee's work. That's why we have these meetings, that's why we have panels and that's why we invite people. I think it's absolutely critical that we put victims' testimony at the centre of our discussion and at the centre of the problem, particularly for those victims who have been courageous enough to come to us directly, or who have spoken to other parliamentary committees and have taken the decision to give their testimony in a public setting.

In fact, that's the very starting point of this problem for this committee—how to empower victims to have the courage, the comfort, the support to come forward. If they get the perception that, for some reason, when they come to a parliamentary committee, having taken the step of going into the public realm, they then become a political footballer, their testimony becoming some sort of a political football, that immediately will reintroduce a chilling effect on the potential of other victims coming forward in equally sensitive scenarios before other committees.

I think Mr. Bagnell is absolutely spot-on when he says this testimony not only needs to be encouraged and supported, but it needs to be put at the very centre of our discussion. I just put that to the committee for consideration.

In addition to that, of course, there's expert testimony, of which we have had substantial amounts. There's testimony from officials, including elected officials, the minister himself, high-ranking officials in ministers' offices, high-ranking officials in the Privy Council Office. That is incredibly important. Academics as well...and in my submission, also testimony from other jurisdictions that have done this work.

The committee really went through a trajectory of discussion on what was put forward. In the minds of some committee members there would be additional testimony that should be pursued at all costs. There would be that extra statement that would really close the loop on fundamental questions that, in my view, had already been answered by other witnesses. That chase for an additional witness was ultimately abandoned in favour of an additional argument, which was to hamper the work of the committee as parliamentarians normally do it.

In prior interventions, Madam Chair, I made reference to the good work of this committee, in the 42nd Parliament, on diversity and inclusion in the armed forces, which had a component on sexual misconduct. In those discussions there was no dissenting report. In those discussions there was absolutely not even a question that colleagues would be able to exercise their full parliamentary rights and privileges in those discussions, and not be somehow limited artificially to a two-minute response without having the ability to then follow up or reply, or even build on the testimony or questions of colleagues that were put forward previously or subsequently.

In a very important respect, Madam Chair, this proposal would also hamper your ability as chair and as a former serving member of the Canadian Forces, and I'm going to say as a woman, to put your own expertise, your own passion into this subject matter, and to guide the discussion as chair of this committee to a fruitful outcome. With the approach that's been suggested by the opposition, that would not take place in a natural way, because it would be artificially truncated by these two-minute segments. That would be one intervention only per paragraph or recommendation, I think, was the framing of that motion.

It's really important that we have substantive testimony firstly from victims, secondly from experts, policy-makers, academics, thirdly from other jurisdictions; but that we then have a process that allows us to go to work on the subject matter as parliamentarians, as this committee has done in the past, as members of all parties of this committee, or many parties of this committee, have done in the 42nd Parliament. We have gone through that experience, we know how it works, we know how productive it can be. We should really unleash our ability as parliamentarians to the utmost to do that work and to get behind the issue and to get on the same side of the table.

With respect to the question before us, again, it has two components. It has the case of the former chief of the defence staff, then followed by another case. The testimony that is at stake with respect to the circumstance of the former CDS, as Mr. Bagnell has pointed out, really takes us in good part back to 2015, and even prior to that period. I think the question that all of us should be interested in across party lines, including members of the Conservative Party, would be how a former chief of the defence staff could hold himself out to be so powerful that he would control the Canadian Forces national investigation service, that he would own them. This investigation goes back to a time of 2015, at the time of his appointment.

That institutionally and systematically is completely unacceptable and must be unacceptable to all of us, regardless of political affiliation. This is not a partisan question. This is a question of how we change the culture in the Canadian Forces, exemplified by this case, but not limited to this case. There may well be other cases. There are, and we certainly have been made aware of, other systemic challenges that prevent additional complainants from coming forward against officers of the Canadian Forces or members of the Canadian Forces of significantly higher rank. That was one of the issues we were most concerned about, the asymmetry between senior and junior ranks.

I've drawn the committee's attention to work that's been done elsewhere. This is not to say necessarily that because other jurisdictions are facing the same problem, the Canadian jurisdiction is somehow less significant. The problem is equally significant in all parts of the world that are dealing with it. However, because we can use those experiences as an example of the kind of work we could and should be doing—10 of the recommendations, 10 of the conclusions and in at least one case, the step of actually having a follow-up exercise within a year of completion of a report on this very same issue—that information, in my view, is extremely relevant to the committee. I've used time before this committee to put it on record, and I will continue to make submissions along those lines.

Madam Chair, at this point I would like to just simply bring to a close my thoughts on what I refer to as the “Wigston report”, the review into inappropriate behaviours out of the United Kingdom. It took place around the same time that we really started to get into this issue. It was tabled in 2019. If we look at other jurisdictions, it's roughly that period, 2015-19, where a lot of other militaries were seized with this issue. Perhaps not in all cases, or maybe not in any cases, it was through an instance involving a former chief of the defence staff like we had, but certainly, it was with the same recognition of the importance of this issue for women members of the armed forces—and ultimately, for all members of the armed forces concerned.

Wigston really gave us the impetus to take a look at what could happen if a government gets behind this issue proactively, in a very progressive way and with progressive time frames. I would like to put to the committee the concluding portion of that report. What I would like to do in later testimony is to briefly highlight some of the insights from the follow-up that took place a year later, in 2020. If we get it right and we get something out to government and government responds, we can get action maybe quicker than any of us would realize.

The Wigston report, in its conclusion, stated the following:

The Report into inappropriate behaviours in Defence makes 36 recommendations on what we should do to stop instances of inappropriate behaviours occurring, and what we should do better when inappropriate behaviours have occurred. Ultimately, the challenge of inappropriate behaviour will only be addressed through a determined effort across the whole force to change the culture, driven persistently from the top and at every level of leadership and line management below that. It requires authentic leadership; relentless engagement; and consistent communication. Everybody has a part to play.

We defined inappropriate behaviours as breaches of laws, norms of behaviour or core values and standards which harm or risk harming individuals, teams or operational effectiveness, and that bring or risk bringing the reputation of individuals, units, the Service or Defence into disrepute. We took a consciously broad view of inappropriate behaviours however we focused first and foremost on those that harm individuals. We judge that an unacceptable level of inappropriate behaviour persists in Defence, however we were unable to quantify it precisely. The evidence reflected in this report indicates a significant number of our people have experienced bullying, discrimination and harassment, including sexual, but have not felt able or been able to come forward to report it. This pattern mirrored what we identified in other organisations including the Canadian Armed Forces, the United States military and the Australian Defence Force.

The absence of reporting reflects a deficit of trust in our complaints system. Our own surveys and external stakeholders highlight repeatedly the shortcomings of the current system for raising complaints about inappropriate behaviour, with complainants citing a fear of retribution and low confidence or faith that anything would be done, or done in a timely manner. We also observed a disproportionate over-representation of women and ethnic minorities in the Service Complaints system, and a lack of data on other minority groups.

Our recommendations on what should be done to tackle inappropriate behaviour focused principally on leadership and line management at every level setting the right culture and standards; ensuring people meet those standards consistently; and being alert to when standards might slip. We also made recommendations about effective, targeted and resourced training; a centralised assurance function; the compilation of a single set of data and statistics relating to inappropriate behaviour; regular Board-level focus on culture and behaviours; and better sharing of leading practice across the three Armed Forces and Civil Service. To do better when instances of inappropriate behaviour have occurred or are alleged to have occurred, we recommended a review of the Service Complaints system to include: a dedicated central Service Complaints team equipped to deal with the most complex allegations of bullying, harassment and discrimination; a helpline for supporting complainants and respondents as well as the chain of command and line management; and a parallel channel for raising Service Complaints outwith the chain of command, including anonymous and bystander reporting. We also recommended consideration of a two-tier process for Service Complaints to streamline the process for more straightforward cases, enabling staff focus and resources to be aligned to the complexity, sensitivity and gravity of the complaint. We identified a need for central oversight of cultures and inappropriate behaviours across Defence. We recommended the establishment of a Defence Authority responsible for cultures and inappropriate behaviours. Working to the Chief of Defence People as the Senior Responsible Owner, the Authority would be responsible for pan-Defence strategy, policy and governance; a single point of reference for all management information; assurance activity across the Armed Forces; and sharing leading practice across Defence. It would also house the central Service Complaints team and related helplines and support services. The Authority would need to be fully resourced with an estimated 30-50 suitably qualified and experienced people, recognising this will be an additional workforce requirement for Defence.

Under the subtitle, “What does good look like?”, the second to last paragraph of the conclusion says the following: “Tackling inappropriate behaviour is about the determination of leaders to change...culture; everything else hangs off that. Real cultural change comes only when leaders communicate and role model those behaviours relentlessly, [when] there is a clear understanding of what they mean in practice, and where there are evident consequences for breaching them. Success might ultimately be judged when matters that arise - as they always [Technical difficulty—Editor] by junior leaders or colleagues instinctively and immediately in every part of Defence. An inappropriate comment is made, a corporal tells the perpetrator to apologise, [Technical difficulty—Editor] why it caused offence, the apology is made and accepted, and the matter resolved. We are already there in many parts of the organisation but changing embedded cultures and driving out inappropriate behaviour across the whole of Defence will take persistent and concerted effort, at every level of leadership and line management, over an extended period of time.

Finally, we would all recognise that inappropriate behaviour, and the consequences for the people affected by it, damages the United Kingdom Armed Forces' hard-won reputation for courage, determination and professionalism. We should not, however, lose perspective on the behaviour of the overwhelming majority of people in Defence who serve with courage, determination, professionalism and great pride, protecting the UK 24/7.”

Madam Chair, that's the concluding section of the Wigston report. As members will have seen through this testimony and other interventions I have made, there is a relevance, a level of granularity, an openness and an acknowledgement of additional gaps that could not be closed. There are also very precise recommendations with respect to resourcing the central defence authority, for example, with staffing levels being recommended of 30 to 50 in this case.

This is the kind of work that was done in the U.K. under circumstances similar to ours, with the exception that it did not—at least I am not aware of it—reach to the highest level of the chief of the defence staff. It's certainly a jurisdiction and an ally with whom we work very closely through the Five Eyes, through NATO, through the United Nations and through bilateral training exercises, which has not only been seized with the importance of this issue, but also looked to our country in several instances, having catalyzed the debate through the Deschamps report of 2015.

The U.K. has gone forward and made progress. I put it to colleagues on this committee that if we get to the same page on this, we can make recommendations of similar impact, granularity, relevance and timeliness, and we can really together move the yardsticks on this issue. I think the Canadian public and serving and former members of the Canadian Armed Forces expect nothing less.

Thank you very much, Madam Chair, I will leave it there. I will have more interventions later on, but that's it for the moment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much, Mr. Spengemann.

We go on to Mr. Baker, please.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thanks very much, Madam Chair.

I wanted to follow up on what Mr. Bagnell was speaking to in his remarks. During his remarks Mr. Bagnell expressed disappointment—I think I'm probably being diplomatic—about Mr. Bezan's comments in our committee at the last meeting when Mr. Bezan used the word “callous” to describe members of the government side who were sharing testimony from another parliamentary committee that was made on the record from survivors of sexual assault and sexual harassment in the armed forces. When Mr. Bagnell expressed that concern, Mr. Bezan called it a “rant”. I thought that was completely inappropriate. Mr. Bezan thought it appropriate to use time in his testimony at the last meeting to criticize members of this side. As disappointing as it was to hear Mr. Bezan say that, none of us interrupted him, and none of us called it a “rant”. I wanted to object to that type of interruption of Mr. Bagnell earlier in the meeting, Madam Chair.

I also wanted to say that it wasn't just in the last meeting that Mr. Bezan shared this point of view. To be frank, I would have expected that he would have reconsidered his point of view after the last meeting. After he had heard from some of the members of the government side who responded to his intervention suggesting that sharing survivor testimony that's on the record from the status of women committee is, as Mr. Bezan called it, “callous”, I thought he would have reconsidered that position. I guess he didn't, or he felt even more strongly about his position, because Mr. Bezan decided to deliver a member's statement in the House of Commons where he said, in referring to government members of the committee, “they are disrespectfully and unfairly quoting survivors of military sexual misconduct”.

What is disrespectful and unfair about sharing the testimony of survivors that has been made before a parliamentary committee on the record? I've been thinking about this for the last couple of days since I heard these words in the House of Commons and I cannot get my head around it. These survivors are the people we should be trying to help. They should be at the centre of what we're doing in this committee. They should be our focus. Success to me is only if we as a committee do everything we can to help these folks. Anything short of that is not success; anything short of that is failure. These are the people we should be trying to help, and these are the people whose voices we should most want to hear. Their perspective, their expertise, is what we should be focusing on and giving the most weight to. It's not just because they're the victims in this, but because they know so much about this and they've thought about it and they've discussed it with people and they're experts, and they know how to fix the problem. These are the people whose voices we should most want to hear.

That's why members of the government side are sharing their testimony, we're giving them a voice, we're amplifying their message. To me, what's disrespectful and unfair is not to listen to that message, not to try to understand, not to make it a priority. What's beyond disrespectful and unfair is to try to silence those voices in any way, shape or form. Mr. Bezan has tried to do that twice on the record. To me, that shows that Mr. Bezan has a very different set of priorities and that he's not interested in solving this problem. If he was, when government members, or any member, was sharing that testimony, he would have been listening the most intently, he would have been the most interested, and maybe he would have shared some of that testimony himself or at least reflected on it.

[Technical difficulty—Editor] the platform in this committee and the platform for sharing the perspective of survivors.

I find that beyond disappointing. I find it beyond reprehensible. I completely agree with what Mr. Bagnell was saying. I think it underlines the problem on this committee. It underlines why we have a motion by Mr. Bezan before us, which is designed to produce a document that does nothing to help survivors.

That's why, in the motion, there is going to be two minutes of debate for each member and then we move on. No consensus would be required under Mr. Bezan's motion in delivery of the report, as there is with every other report that is produced by a committee in the House of Commons, because Mr. Bezan just wants to ram it through. He doesn't want to deal with these challenging issues, clearly.

The only way to get to a report that helps survivors is to build consensus. It's to list the survivors, first of all. That goes without saying, I would have thought. Certainly after having done that, we should sit down together as a committee and wrestle with our differences of opinion and find that consensus. Then, after we find that consensus around what the problems are, we should come to a consensus on the solutions, and then make recommendations, and then put them before the government and urge the government, insist that the government act on them. That's the purpose of this committee, and every committee: to make change for the positive.

The issue before us that we need to make change on is what is happening in the armed forces and the sexual assault and the sexual misconduct that we've heard about. It's about helping the survivors. That should be the focus of the report.

Mr. Bezan's motion prevents us from doing that, because we can't debate these complex issues. We can't come to a consensus on these complex issues, and then [Technical difficulty—Editor] basically decide which clauses go in and out, which clauses stay and which clauses [Technical difficulty—Editor] for us to quote survivors of military sexual misconduct.

Mr. Bezan's motion is disrespectful and unfair to those survivors. That's what's disrespectful and unfair, because all it would be is a report that doesn't take on and solve the challenges facing survivors, facing the Canadian Armed Forces.

Mr. Bezan can hold it up and say, “See? We produced a report”, a report that is absolutely useless at solving the problem that we should be solving.

The reason others and I are sharing what survivors are telling us is that we're trying to remind the members of this committee what we should be focused on and what needs to be in that report and why Mr. Bezan's motion would prevent us from issuing a report that helps survivors. In fact, issuing a report the way Mr. Bezan proposes would be harmful, in my view. It would claim to be a report that addresses the issues of sexual harassment and sexual assault in the military, but it wouldn't, because Mr. Bezan doesn't want to discuss them. He doesn't want to deal with the nuances. He doesn't want to deal with the complexity. He just wants to release a document and move on. That would be disrespectful and unfair.

That's why we're sharing and that's why I am going to continue to share.

One of the folks who presented to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, whose perspective I think is important to hear from and to take heed of, is Ms. MJ Batek.

I want to share with you some of what Ms. Batek shared with our colleagues. She says:

I'm here as a veteran military sexual trauma survivor, a military domestic violence sexual survivor and as a representative of the Survivor Perspectives Consulting Group, also referred to as SPCG. SPCG was recently created by a small group of military sexual trauma survivors. For decades, we have watched in silence and have now come together to take action, to ensure survivor voices are heard, and create solutions to help combat this crisis. Just as the Government of Canada uses gender-based analysis plus, which goes beyond sex in gender to other intersecting identity factors, such as race, ethnicity or age, the Canadian Armed Forces should consider the perspective of military sexual trauma survivors at every stage of the strategy and policy development. We at SPCG are willing to work towards the provision of that perspective in a professionally coordinated format. We do not propose to have all of the answers as we are not organizational culture or military justice experts, but we are the unfortunate experts by experience of military sexual trauma.

I'm going to pause here. This is what I was referring to a few moments ago. Here, you have somebody who's a survivor, who has experience and who is working together with other survivors to identify solutions to the problem and, as she says, to create solutions to combat this crisis. Those were her words.

There are two points I want to make about the initial part of her testimony. First of all, these are the kinds of people we need to be hearing from. These are people who are not only survivors whose perspectives we should be focused on intently, listening to and learning from, but these are also experts. That's the first thing.

The second point is that even though Ms. Batek is a survivor and really knowledgeable and has worked hard with others to become really knowledgeable to develop those solutions, even she is admitting that, “We do not propose to have all of the answers as we are not organizational culture or military justice experts, but we are the unfortunate experts by experience of military sexual trauma”.

By any measure, I think we could all agree that Ms. Batek is an expert, but even she is saying that she's not an expert in all aspects of solving this problem. If the experts acknowledge that we need other experts to help with components of the problem, surely we need all of their help to solve this problem. Surely we need to hear from all of them and we need to incorporate all of that in a report to the extent that we have heard from them.

She speaks specifically about how they are not organizational culture or military justice experts. How many times have we heard and spoken about culture at this committee and how difficult that is and how much change is needed in the armed forces? We've heard from expert after expert who has presented to this committee about how changes in culture are desperately needed in the armed forces and how difficult that is to implement in any organization, especially as one as large and as hierarchal as the armed forces.

Many of the members on the committee have spoken about this in our discussions. Mr. Bagnell especially continues to highlight the importance of culture change to solve this problem.

One of my points is that we need to hear from Ms. Batek and others like her. We need to make sure that knowledge and expertise is brought into this report. We need to also heed her warning that there are other people we need to turn to for expertise on military justice and on organizational culture. All of that has to make it into the report.

For that to happen, we need more than two minutes of debate each, or discussion each. It has taken me more than two minutes just to explain why Ms. Batek's testimony is so important and why we need to hear from these experts. It will take us time.

It will take hard work to convey and debate and find consensus around what we actually want to recommend as a committee, which is why, in my view, Mr. Bezan's motion is so dangerous and disrespectful to survivors.

I'd like to go on reading from the testimony that Ms. Batek provided to the status of women committee:

We can help define this problem, the full extent of which is still unknown. We can point to specific gaps, deficiencies and issues. We know, for example, that the internal reporting mechanism is flawed and that independent oversight is badly needed. We can help find and develop solutions—immediate, medium and long-term solutions—because we have ideas. We have ideas that can be developed into plans, policies and programs. For example, we have developed a one-day workshop that can be used in the immediate term to help kick-start the culture shift that is desperately needed throughout the organization. This training package, called the frontline workshop, is survivor born and is based on civilian best practices curated specifically for the Canadian Armed Forces. The frontline workshop will challenge and confront the social norms and unconscious biases of the attendees. It will shake their foundation and open their minds unlike anything the military has done before. We can provide feedback on and input into strategies, plans and policies every step of the way, during development, implementation and monitoring stages.

I want to pause there in Ms. Batek's testimony.

Ms. Batek and her colleagues are proposing a solution to part of the problem. They're proposing to offer their help to solve the problem in a concrete, tangible way. Is the committee going to recommend that? Is this committee going to consider that? Clearly it is not if Mr. Bezan has his way, because Mr. Bezan doesn't want to even hear from Ms. Batek. However, even if he did hear from Ms. Batek, even if we all listened to what Ms. Batek had to say, which is why I'm sharing what she had to say, would we implement, would we ask her and her colleagues to implement the solution they're offering to the Canadian Armed Forces? Would we recommend that the government implement it? We don't know.

The reason we don't know is that some members of this committee don't want to take the time to know. They want to tick the box, say they wrote a report, which does nothing for survivors. It is beyond belief, really. They're offering a frontline workshop that will challenge and confront the social norms and unconscious biases of the attendees, something we've heard about, over and over again, from people who've tried to underline or explain why this problem of sexual harassment and assault in the military exists. They're offering to help us solve that problem and we're going to refuse to have an opinion on it.

We are going to put ourselves in a position where we can't consider it, because we can only spend two minutes each talking. Some members of the opposition just want to move on to other things and they want to have a big debate in the House of Commons without actually considering what Ms. Batek has to say or what she has to offer, or the impact she could have on solving this problem.

I don't understand why our priority is moving on, with moving on from this report in a way that's not helpful to the survivors so we can have a debate in the House of Commons. We can have debates in the House of Commons, and we should, and we can continue to do that in the years to come. In the months and years to come, I'm happy to participate in those debates, but we are MPs. We're not the experts. The experts are talking to us. We should listen to them and we should think about what they've said and thoughtfully review it together and come to a consensus together like we do for every other report we ever write.

Then we should do what Mr. Bagnell is proposing in his subamendment and that is to make sure that the government actually responds. The only way to ensure that our committee has any impact is to make sure that we not only write a thoughtful report but that government is accountable for responding and tackling those challenges.

We and others can hold government to account for doing what they said they would do in their response, but Mr. Bezan doesn't want them to respond. He doesn't want to hold the government accountable for solving this problem. The only reason I can imagine is because they don't want to actually solve the problem.

He wants to have this debate in the House of Commons so he can grab some headlines and play some politics. That's not why I'm here. That's not why I ran for office. The survivors expect and deserve better.

Ms. Batek goes on to say:

Just like any GPA+ analysis of various identity factors, we want to provide the military sexual trauma survivor perspective with potential solutions to the Canadian Armed Forces as a professional voice, as well as to other stakeholders such as Veterans Affairs Canada. We are currently in the building phase of our organization, but we are aiming to represent multiple identity factors, including men, indigenous, veteran, LGBTQ+ and civilian survivors, among others, as this is not specifically a women's issue. Yes, I did say civilian survivors, because it is important to note that the impact of a sexualized military culture is not limited to members of the military. The impact reaches beyond the perimeter of the workplace and negatively affects the lives of military families, spouses and children as well as the community at large.

I want to pause on that point.

Ms. Batek is flagging for us that this problem extends beyond where many people think it extends to. She's talking about civilian survivors. She's talking about other groups of people who are impacted. I think we need to hear that, we need to listen, and then we need to write a thoughtful report that takes into account Ms. Batek's testimony and the testimony of other survivors, experts and the others we've heard from, all of them. I know it's going to be hard work and I know it's going to require a lot of consensus building, but we have to do it, because that's how we can get to a report that makes a difference or that has recommendations to government that can make a difference.

We need Mr. Bagnell's amendment to pass, because we need government to be accountable for implementing those things. If the government implements those things that we recommend, we are helping to address the problem of sexual assault and sexual misconduct in the military.

I say we listen to survivors. I say we write a report that's thoughtful, that allows us to come to consensus, that obtains a government response and that demands government actions, because I think survivors deserve no less.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much, Mr. Baker.

We will move on to Mr. Bagnell, please.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Obviously, we're at an impasse that stops us getting forward with recommendations that can help the military and help the survivors, because at the moment, the opposition refuses to withdraw a motion that would lead to an unreasonable report.

I proposed a possible way forward. I haven't put in an amendment yet, but it was a compromise where we could get some recommendations to help the military and to help the future men and women who want to go into the military and so that the survivors have been heard. My solution was roughly that we go through all recommendations from all parties, see which ones we could unanimously agree to use Mr. Bezan's process on, get those recommendations forward and then deal with the more difficult ones at the end.

I haven't heard any objections from the opposition parties, so I assume they're still discussing it. The committee will have to wait until we see a response before we can go forward.

What I really want to do today, because the particular motion doesn't allow us to debate recommendations—other than the two minutes which, as the previous speaker mentioned, is totally inappropriate for a number of very serious recommendations—I want to propose some major recommendations today, and then those members who are interested can help me word them, reword them or object to them, and we could have a debate on each of those, but that will have to wait.

Before doing that, I want to, as I've said earlier today and before, time and time again, and the previous speaker just mentioned it as well.... The serious recommendations we make should be based upon what the witnesses told us and what the experts have told us. The recommendations I will come up with for our discussions at subsequent meetings are based on the testimony of those experts and witnesses, which is what all committees do. They hear witnesses, and then that's what's in the report, what the witnesses said and what is recommended.

I just want to go into some of that expert witness testimony from elsewhere, because it leads to some of the recommendations that I am going to make later on.

Ms. Lalonde said:

I can tell you that the highest rate of post-traumatic stress disorder worldwide is among victims of rape and sexual violence. The second-highest rate is in the military. We urgently need to take this seriously. Trauma shouldn't be organized into a hierarchy. When their trauma isn't considered equivalent to the trauma caused by war, victims of sexual violence don't receive the support that they deserve. That's unacceptable.

Later on I'll be making a recommendation related to our report, related exactly to that, that this type of trauma has to be treated equally with other types of trauma.

There was another question: “How important is it that this is a constantly evolving way of finding solutions? ... How important is it that this is a constantly evolving process? ”

Dr. Okros said:

First of all, I definitely agree that it is important, and I definitely agree on the evolving. One of the challenges of Operation Honour was that there was an end state. There is no end state to the way in which Canadian society has continued to evolve and, therefore, to how the Canadian Armed Forces has to continually evolve. I think these will be valuable and required processes going forward.

The other comment I would make is that, while there are efforts to reach out, again, we need to understand the consequences of military sexual trauma. We need to understand that there are still individuals who are not able or willing or in a position to come forward and speak. I think part of this needs to be reaching out to the organizations and to the colleagues they are willing to talk to, in order to have individuals bring their voices forward.

We've heard before in some other testimony from high-ranking military members that there are more stories to come, and that they just haven't been able under the circumstances to bring them forward. That's the type of recommendation we should be looking at, how it can be appropriate and easy for them to bring it forward and not have reprisals.

I'm just going on with the quote.

The last quick comment I will make is that we need to be very careful about people speaking for others. I cannot speak for members of the armed forces, and I definitely cannot speak for women. I think we have concerns when people choose to speak for other groups.

That's why it's very important that we hear the direct testimony of victims and people who are involved on the ground who can outline the horrific situations they've been in. I still think over and over again that if that happened to me, I have no idea how I would handle that. People cannot denigrate the gravity of those instances over a lifetime.

Then it went on to talk about power imbalance. The question was, “In what way do we need to address [that]...in order to be able to get to the point where we're preventing all of this kind of behaviour in the first place?” To the quote I gave earlier from the debate in the House of Commons on Wednesday night, I mentioned a quote related to that earlier in this meeting. I mentioned a quote related to power imbalance. Dr. Okros said:

This is part of self-insight and self-understanding. I think the more we can do to facilitate people.... I will say that I'm the best representative on the screen. Old white men like me in particular need to really open up our eyes and start learning. We also need to look at customs and practices that reinforce these things. A simple example is visible in this committee.

That was the committee he was speaking to.

The speaking order and length of time for questions signal a power hierarchy. We need to be thinking about what message is sent. Who is the least important person on this screen right now? What are the ways in which we can level or address those or make sure that those who perceive they're the least important are still empowered to speak up and speak out?

It's complex. All organizations, all institutions, practice it. It requires open communications. The most critical thing I would go back to is that it needs those who have the weakest voice to be able to be heard the most.

I'm sure, as you know from testimony we've heard, that it's simply not the case at the moment. She gave us all food for thought and no easy solutions. I don't know what all of the solutions are. That's why we need to debate more than two minutes very serious recommendations and try to come to the best conclusions on those recommendations.

On the urgency of taking action now, Dr. Okros said:

This is urgent. We have people who are still hurting. We have members internally within the military. It's been stated. They have lost trust. That needs to be rebuilt with urgency. Canadians need to have confidence in their military. They need to have confidence that when particularly young women, young men and people of diverse identities choose to serve Canada in uniform, they will be treated with respect and have good, full, meaningful careers. That needs to be something that is communicated effectively.

Christine Wood went on after that, on getting to action:

I can tell you things that you have heard before. Victims need supports. There are more and more coming forward and there is still no safety net there to catch them. These individuals are not coming forward to report a simple discrepancy that they saw in paperwork. They are coming forward with their experiences of terror, debilitating anxiety and shredded self-confidence. They are broken. It is simply unethical to continue to ask them to come forward without having a plan in place to support them.

To be clear, we are asking for the same supports that we were asking for four years ago: a national platform for online peer support, group therapy, outpatient therapy and in-patient psychiatric care when necessary that is MST-specific in its focus. It needs to be trauma informed and needs to be able to address the moral injury of betrayal by your brothers and sisters in uniform.

That's why in my recommendation I said I will be bringing it forward later for extensive debate. We have to talk about that peer support that has been recommended there.

If the committee brings forward some recommendations, it will help survivors. If the opposition lets us get by this impasse, if we can bring forward recommendations, people will want to have confidence that they will be implemented. That's why my amendment to the motion is that we should have a reply that the government is going to be implementing them.

There was a suggestion that there's a loss of trust and that it needs to be overcome. Obviously, there are certain senior leaders in the military presently under investigation and we'll let that run its course.

In reference to the minister, I know Mr. Bezan has been criticized a lot today, but this is not something he brought up; it was another committee member. If the committee members are interested in progress, when has there been a minister who is so open to the progress? As I mentioned, if there are media watching who weren't at all the previous committee meetings, I spoke for close to an hour about the things that have been done by this government and under this minister. That's a good record that people can go to in case someone says that things have not been done.

Obviously, the minister is the first to admit, as the committee and the number of incidents that Mr. Garrison and I have outlined show, there's a lot more that needs to be done. These are the things that we should be discussing.

To assure you that the government is open to respond, if there are some suggestions that there's no response because they won't, as Mr. Baker said earlier today, out of the three big items that really need recommendations, the first is culture change.

To show you that the minister is open to culture change, as he said, anything is on the table. He's just waiting for us to move ahead as a committee and make recommendations. He's not actually waiting. Because we're stalled, he has gone ahead and made some major appointments, including Madam Arbour. With or without us, he's moving ahead, and we will certainly get our recommendations to him. I will, one way or another.

However, just to show you that he's open, I'm going to quote him for anyone who suggests that there's a lack of openness from the minister to listening to our recommendations for change. As everyone knows, change is often difficult.

We could spend a whole committee on the quotes of how he's willing to look at what we're proposing, what victims are proposing and what experts are proposing to try to deal with a difficult situation that plagues not only our military, but militaries around the world. Of course, culture is important, because you can't blame individual members totally if they're in a culture where that's acceptable. We're social animals, so we have to improve that culture.

To show that the minister is open to change, I'll just go through some comments he made. He said in the other committee:

Culture change is something we're all committed to. I believe that in the committee here, there are some wonderful recommendations that can be provided, but also a need to look at changes that need to be made. We need to make sure we just don't look at a report, look at a recommendation, sign off, and think it's done.

That's very insightful by the minister. I've mentioned at earlier meetings that not only was there roughly an hour of things I outlined that have been done, including an update of an administrative procedure that I thought was much better than the previous one, but obviously, as the minister has just said in what I quoted, they're not all working. You can't just make the recommendation. You must have the appropriate follow-up.

He went on:

For example, I can list off a whole bunch of things, but ultimately I'm always looking at what results we are creating on the ground. When somebody is joining, are they in basic training and having a safe environment?

Again, that's very perceptive, because as was mentioned before, there was an incident in basic training. A recommendation was that this needed to be incorporated, related to sexual misconduct and inappropriate behaviour, yet the trainer was besieged by laughs and ridicule by the people taking the training because that was the particular culture. Therefore, it can't just be the recommendation. As the minister says, there has to be the follow-up.

On creating a safe environment, I'm quoting the minister again:

If something comes up, whether it's a religious conversation, a gender issue, LGBTQ rights, or anything, we should immediately address it, because the Employment Equity Act states that we must. Do we have the right action groups? Do they have the right governance structure? This is what the independent panel on systemic racism, gender bias and LGBTQ rights is currently doing: looking at where those issues are, digging deep inside the Canadian Armed Forces and looking at what changes are needed.

Again, as you can see, the minister is open to change and already has taken significant action. That's the type of champion we need to bring our recommendations forward.

The minister went on:

I talked about the numbers, and right now, those aren't the metrics we want to judge ourselves by, but you know what? That's progress. It's not success. Going from six to 14 general officers is important, but the pipeline—when you look below that and when you create a greater pipeline—can never be stopped. Why was it, with regard to the representation of women, that the percentages were obviously nothing to be proud of? If it was 15% women in the past, why didn't we have 15% women before? One of my goals was to immediately start making those changes, so when somebody had a complaint, they could come forward, regardless of retribution. When I sign off on any general officers, I don't look at what their ability to command is; I trust they can do that. The question I ask is, “Are these persons leaders who can bring in cultural change?” If they are not, we don't want them being promoted, but if they are, we want to give them proper resources to do so.

Again, the minister is almost ahead of us here in making these suggested changes, because that would be one of the recommendations that I've referred to as needed and that I think the parliamentary secretary has referred to: what is taken into consideration during promotion. Obviously it has to be looked at in our recommendations and in our systems.

The minister went on:

We also need to make sure we have senior women at the table, so that we have proper representation. This is not the be-all and end-all, but it does make sure that we have the right people to put the right structures in place. We need to look at how the independent investigations are conducted.

Of course, I mentioned a potential question about that earlier, related to General Vance's appointment; and survivors have brought up the second big issue, which I'm not going to address right now, but that's the chain of command involvement related to investigations.

The minister went on:

We need to take a look at whether we have the right resources in place, so that people are supported.

In the testimony of the experts that I just read a few minutes ago, that was one of the points they raised as well, and the minister is right on that:

The one question I have...is, if somebody has done something in the past, would it be acceptable for them to join the Canadian Armed Forces? If somebody does something inside the Canadian Armed Forces, why can't we get them out sooner?

The minister is already looking at all these questions and he is obviously moving forward and looking at very important considerations. However, we could add to that. We've spent a lot of time studying and hearing experts and witnesses, and we could actually add to that if people would co-operate and come together on the things that we can at least agree on. Obviously, there are some things we won't agree on.

The minister went on:

Those also have to go through proper legal checks and balances, because ultimately I can't make a decision on that. That's the law. We have to follow the law, and if changes need to be made, we go through the parliamentary process to get those laws changed, so that we can create the proper changes. Ultimately, all of us—including this committee, and I look forward to your recommendations—need to be able to do the ripple effect of any recommendation to see how it can actually have that impact. Too often in the past, what we have done and where we made some changes, they actually didn't achieve the outcomes we wanted. When I became minister, that was the last thing I wanted, giving out these speeches. I wanted to be focused on the metrics themselves and the changes we're making.

That, from my perspective, is insightful from the minister. We don't hear often enough that it's the measurement of the outcomes that is important. Certainly we can consider that if we're allowed to have a serious discussion on recommendations.

The minister went on:

We have made progress, and we're proud of that progress, but obviously, this is not enough

As I said earlier, the minister has said that many times.

He continued:

I'm deeply hurt that we couldn't move forward, and I wish we had a magic wand to make all this go away, but we don't. At the same time, I didn't quit before, when I was serving to support the people, and I'm not going to quit now. I'm committed to our Canadian Armed Forces and to ensuring we create an inclusive environment—

You heard earlier in his statement about ways he's already working on that.

—because there are people in Canada right now who want to serve their country. They deserve to have a harassment-free workplace so they can reach their true potential. We're not going to stop until we achieve that, regardless of how long it takes.

You can see that there's no question that the minister and government are not ready to respond; they're ready to take our recommendations seriously. He said previously that everything is on the table.

That's why I have said over and over that we should get to these serious recommendations that would help survivors, based on the testimony we've heard from survivors and the experts. I hope to hear some more of it so that I can refine the recommendations. I want to have a lengthy discussion at this meeting or at subsequent meetings about that.

I will leave it at that for now. Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much, Mr. Bagnell.

We will move on to Madame Vandenbeld, please.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I want to thank my colleagues for their thoughtful interventions today.

I am still disappointed that we are continuing to debate motion after motion. The opposition continues to rebuff any efforts to withdraw this motion, adjourn the debate or even allow us to adjourn this meeting, knowing we would then be able to get directly to the reports. I am disappointed that all three opposition parties have rebuffed good-faith efforts to see if we can get past this impasse.

I was particularly disturbed earlier when Mr. Bagnell was giving a proposal, which I believe to be very sincere, to see how we can get past this impasse, at least in part. He was being laughed and scoffed at by members of the opposition here in the room. It's one thing for us to disagree, but it's another to laugh at each other. I really think we're above that, and I believe that Mr. Bagnell was sincere in what he was proposing, just as I have been in the various proposals that I have brought to all three opposition parties and that other members of the committee have discussed.

At this point, one of the best things we can do is make sure, regardless of what happens with the reports, particularly when we have motions that ask for no government response.... I am very grateful to Mr. Bagnell for bringing forward an amendment that says we do need a government response, because what is the reason we are here and putting a report to Parliament if it's not to have the government respond to that report and take action on it? I'm hopeful, but I'm also very disappointed that there does not seem to be any good-faith willingness to try to get beyond this impasse.

Having said that, I'd like to continue where I left off last time and talk about some of the very important recommendations that some of our witnesses, survivors, academics and experts have brought to our committee, to the FEWO committee and to us as members of Parliament. I believe that these are vitally important recommendations. I am very glad to hear my colleagues talk about the importance of making sure that we are amplifying the voices of survivors and experts. We heard from academics who have spent their entire academic careers looking at these kinds of issues, and they have solutions. We've heard a lot of recommendations and a lot of solutions, so I'd like to continue to put on the record and amplify some of those voices and recommendations.

As those who were watching this meeting previously will recall, I've been going through a list of various recommendations that we compiled based on testimony, particularly what we have heard from survivors. We have compiled them into a section on culture change in the Canadian Armed Forces. I will begin where I left off.

The next recommendation is about addressing the generalized lack of expertise on sexual misconduct, culture change or gender issues in the Canadian Armed Forces.

I think it's interesting that the survivors put that forward in particular, because I think “lack of expertise” can mean many things. First of all, I believe there is increasingly more expertise on this issue. Of course, within the SMRC, which is on the departmental side, there is developing expertise not just in terms of people, but also in the data they're collecting and through combined knowledge and the knowledge creation that comes from lived experience. I believe there is more and more expertise, certainly on both sides and within the Canadian Armed Forces, because of the training we have put in place. However, I think when the survivors put this particular recommendation forward, it was more to talk about the gaps.

We know that somebody who is trained to be a soldier, a sailor or an aviator is somebody whose main job every day is to protect Canadians.

They are very specialized and well trained. It does not mean that they would necessarily have the in-depth level of expertise that one needs in order to provide advice, particularly when it comes to institutional culture change. Culture change is not easy, especially when it is dependent on self-reflection.

I've worked in institutions around the world, with UN Women and other global institutions, on culture change. It requires a set of eyes coming from outside, simply because culture is something you're unaware of. When you're in a particular institutional culture, it can be very difficult to recognize the things that make up that culture. They become self-evident; there are certain paradigms that everybody shares. Unless somebody is directly confronted with something that they consider self-evident and are asked why they have that belief, why they hold that particular notion and then have to reflect on it, then that particular culture and that paradigm are not going to change. That is what requires the outside expertise.

I do believe that this is expertise on a number of levels. This would, of course, be people who are subject matter experts in issues of sexual misconduct, trauma-informed experts who understand how to investigate. We need experts on essentially how to respond to these issues, but we also need experts on culture change, institutional culture, processes and procedures. I think it is really telling that the survivors themselves are asking for that to come from outside the Canadian Armed Forces, in some ways to put up a mirror to show what it looks like to somebody who is not already embedded in it, and honestly, to somebody who isn't invested in things staying the same.

Many of us know that once you're in an institution, and of course you believe in that institution fundamentally, it's such a betrayal when that institution fails you. Those who are in the Canadian Armed Forces, by their nature, believe in what they're doing, believe in the institution. It's very hard to be self-reflective and to look at the flaws within. I think this recommendation is particularly important and certainly would be worthy of putting in a report.

The next recommendation is to acknowledge that the CAF's current approach of self-monitoring is “too reactive, inconsistent, linear and simplistic to be effective and successful against the complex problem of sexual violence.”

I think that these words that were chosen by survivors and witnesses are very telling and very important. First is the idea of self-monitoring being “too reactive”. I think that is, sadly, something that we have seen, instead of looking proactively, preventing or taking actions before there is a significant crisis or problem. I do believe that it's been recognized. It's certainly been recognized by the acting chief, the minister, myself and many others. The approach to self-monitoring should not be reactive, but should be something you do before it reaches a crisis. That's very important.

The next one is even more important. It is that the CAF's current approach is “inconsistent”. This is something that we've seen in the testimony. We certainly saw the differences in the way that men and women who commit almost the same or exactly the same offence are treated differently. Sometimes in your chain of command, the resources available to you would allow for things to be resolved in an equitable and just way, and there are just outcomes. But, for others... I think this is why Justice Fish made the recommendation that the chain of command be taken out of military investigations involving military police or CFNIS. Investigations should not rely on the chain of command, particularly if the chain of command is where the problem is.

If that's where the harassment is occurring, it's very important that it be done independently. It has to be independent because of this inconsistency.

The one thing that is required and necessary is for people to feel that they have trust in an institution, for people to feel that it will be fair to them, whether they're a victim or a perpetrator, whether it is a serious misconduct issue or something like a joke, which is also very serious. However, no matter what it is, it is the consistency in the response, if people know that regardless of who brings it up, regardless of the rank or position of the person who's perpetrating, regardless of where they are in the chain of command, regardless of what their role is, they will have consistent application of the policies, the procedures, the values and the processes in order to get a just outcome.

In fact, I would say that a just outcome is defined by the fact that it is consistent and not dependent on who happens to be in your unit, or who your chain of command is or who you are.

The next one—and I will be honest, I'm not entirely certain what it means, and I think we would need to do a little more reflection and thinking on it—is the choice of the word “linear”. The survivors have put this forward, saying that CAF's current approach of self-monitoring is too linear. This is just my own interpretation, but I think what they're saying, when they say it's too linear, is that it is an action and then a consequence, and it just goes in a straight line as opposed to looking at the full context, looking 360 degrees, making sure that we're not just looking at a equals b equals c, but actually looking at everything around so that we can actually change the culture. However, I'm actually not certain. That's an area that certainly we could delve into a little more.

The next one is a bit more obvious: the choice of the word “simplistic”, that the CAF's current approach of self-monitoring is simplistic. That's an easy trap to fall into.

We have seen that this is a complex issue. In the beginning, when we started our study, which I'll remind members was supposed to be three days and has gone on for about four months, I think most of us thought we understood. Most of us thought we had a bit of a handle on it. We knew that bad things had happened and we thought we knew how they should be fixed. However, the more we delved into it, the more we heard from witnesses, the more we heard from the academics and from members of CAF, from people who are actually part of the process, I think we learned how complex it is. That's exactly why the motion before us, which says we can only spend two minutes each discussing these recommendations, doesn't work. It isn't simplistic. It is very nuanced, very complicated. Even the solutions are complicated.

We've heard so many proposals from very credible witnesses. In some cases, these proposals have been complementary to one another, but in other cases, they have been contradictory.

There are those who propose solutions, who say that we need to put everything into one. We need to take the SMRC, the ombudsperson and an inspector general type of office and put it all in one place. There are others who say that if you have the investigative arm, which is investigating perpetrators, in the same place as the support for the survivors, the advocates, the counselling, the policy and the data, there needs to be some kind of division there, otherwise you have the very same people counselling survivors and doing the investigation at the same time and providing whatever supports or processes for the people who are conducting this bad behaviour.

We've heard that. We've heard a number of different solutions in what ways it should report to Parliament. What does “independent” mean? We know that when the Deschamps report, in 2015, went to the highest levels of CAF, the definition of independence, to CAF, was that it be outside the Canadian Armed Forces, outside the chain of command.

By putting it under the Department of National Defence, the civilian side of National Defence, who are not in the actual chain of command because they're not actually military members—often many of them are ex-military—that was seen by many to be considered independent.

We know now that it didn't work. We know now that's not independent enough. We've heard from so many of the witnesses that it wasn't working for them, that putting it under DND was not necessarily what Madam Deschamps would have intended. However, for many people, that was the interpretation.

Now that we know this, it also shows, by the way, why it is so important that we have Madam Arbour. Madam Deschamps did a very effective job of identifying the problem and identifying what needed to be done. There needs to be an independent body, but actually getting from the what to the how, actually putting together a road map, specifics of exactly how to do this, if you asked 25 of the people who came before us, you could probably get as many as 25 solutions about how you actually put that in place. That piece is the hardest. We all know that. In our own lives, we know that. We often know what we need to do, but how do we do it? What is the first step? What does it look like at the end? What are the unintended consequences? This particular file is full of unintended consequences.

Operation Honour had unintended consequences. I believe those who initially established Operation Honour did so in good faith and believed the impact of it would have brought the results.

We now see that many of the things in Operation Honour did not have the intended impact or results, and what we've seen, actually, is that certain things were harmful. We know that things like the duty to report have taken away agency of individual victims, individual survivors, people who go through certain kinds of behaviour and then perhaps either are not ready to go forward with a full-out investigation or choose to try to do it in a different way.

We know that sometimes, on certain things, it's better to make sure that the people who have experienced it have the agency and are able to control how and when these things come forward. In many cases, informing the perpetrator that somebody has complained is perhaps the thing that the person fears most, but because of duty to report, that has happened and it might happen before someone feels ready. It could be that with the right supports, with the right options placed before them, with the right understanding of process, with the right advocates beside them, people would want to come forward, go through a full investigation and be able to confront that person and see that the person comes to justice. However, the duty to report took that away. It forced people into that before they were ready or when they specifically didn't want to.

It's very hard, because one thing we see is that bystanders are very important, that people who see wrong need to call it out. It is a really hard thing to know, when somebody is calling out somebody else. We call it, in certain other areas of feminism, the “white knight syndrome”.

I think most of us as women have had those circumstances where a very well-intentioned ally, a male who wants to do the right thing and stand up for women, jumps in, in defence, at a point where a) you might have been perfectly capable of defending yourself, or b) you didn't want that because it makes you feel like you're somehow incapable of defending yourself or less.

That white knight syndrome is really hard, because for a lot of men—I've spoken with a number of men, even in my own life, who genuinely want to do the right thing—it's not easy to know at what point you have to call it out, at what point you have to report and at what point you are actually taking away that agency and sense of power from that person, the victim.

That's why there is this reflection on duty to report and making it duty to respond, because responding doesn't necessarily entail reporting, but it means you have to do something.

You can't ignore it. You can't brush it under the carpet. You can't just let it be. You have to respond, but respond appropriately. That's where a lot of the training comes in. Going back to the previous recommendation, that's where a lot of the expertise is too. We need external expertise from people who know about these things and who can give training and guidance to ensure that whatever we do does not have the unintended consequences that many of the things we've tried so far have had.

The rest of this says, “to be effective and successful against the complex problem of sexual violence.” There we have it. Right there in the recommendations brought to us by survivors, they talk about this as a very complex problem. If it was an easy problem, it would have been resolved. It is a very difficult problem because it isn't about individual behaviour. It is, as we've said, about the entire context, the entire culture: the assumptions, the preconceived notions and the ways in which people interact with each other.

Again, I will go back to Dr. Okros, who was extremely good at explaining to us the power dynamics that happen and that in any given space, we determine... I think Mr. Bagnell was very self-reflective when he talked about the idea of who is most important in the room. How do we navigate that?

Madam Chair, in this particular room, you're sitting at the front, and that would indicate to many people that you are the most important person in the room. I tend to agree. Wassim, the clerk, is also sitting there, on your right, and we know that sitting at the right or left of the chair puts a person in a very elevated position. If we didn't know anybody in this room and walked into the room, we would immediately know certain things about your importance. Then we would look to body language and the way people interact.

I would like to go back, though. I've talked about who is important, how we determine that and how we try to elevate ourselves or diminish others to change social structures and what is important, so I'll go back to what happened earlier in this meeting.

Mr. Bagnell was putting a sincere idea forward about how to get past this impasse and how to find consensus, and he was snickered at and laughed at. One of the key ways that people determine power is through ridiculing, diminishing, snickering and laughing, and we saw it right here in this room earlier today. Frankly, I am extremely disappointed, because we are all members of Parliament and are held to a much higher standard of behaviour, particularly towards one another. We know that this is the kind of behaviour that is intended to diminish. It is intended to show who is important and who is not.

We've seen it in other ways as well. We've seen it in the use of language. Men are referred to by their title or by their last name—Mr. whoever—and women are almost always referred to by their first name. This is in public settings. Obviously when you're in a personal environment it's a different thing, but in an official formal public setting, there is a diminishing that happens when you refer to people by their first name as opposed to “Mr.” or whatever the title is.

These are all subtle things that we don't really know we're doing, although I would suggest that earlier today members probably did know what they were doing. Sometimes it's deliberate and sometimes it's not.

I'll end here because I've got quite a few other recommendations. I just want to say that the committee worked very well together for the first year and a half that I was on it, and I know we're at an impasse. However, I really hope that in some way we'll be able to find a way past this impasse. Maybe we could find some way to put our own interests aside and put the survivors ahead, and make sure these recommendations get out. That's why I'm reading them into the record.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

We are suspended.

[The meeting was suspended at 3 p.m., Friday, June 11]

[The meeting resumed at 11:07 a.m., Monday, June 14]

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

I call this meeting back to order.

Good morning and welcome, everyone.

This is the resumption of meeting number 32 of the House of Commons Standing Committee on National Defence, which started on Friday, May 21, 2021.

If at any time interpretation is lost, please inform me immediately and we will ensure that interpretation is operating before we continue. It's important that everyone has an opportunity to participate fully in these proceedings.

As a reminder, please speak slowly and clearly, and I will try to do the same, for our good interpreters. With regard to a speaking list, the committee clerk and I will do the best we can to maintain a consolidated order of speakers for all members, whether they're participating virtually or in person.

We are resuming debate on Mr. Bagnell's amendment to Mr. Bezan's motion.

Madam Vandenbeld has the floor.

[Anita Vandenbeld, Liberal, Ottawa West—Nepean, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I do believe that at the last meeting I left off by going through some of the very important recommendations that survivors have presented to us, either through testimony at FEWO or directly. I just want to start by saying that I do wish that we actually had agreement from the opposition to adjourn debate so that we could immediately get to the reports. There are three very important reports that I think it would be very important for us to go to directly to consider drafting.

What we're debating right now is an amendment that asks that we have a government response, and again, I reiterate that I don't see the purpose of having reports and then not asking the government to respond to those reports. As a result, we're still here, and I will continue discussing these important recommendations so that at least we can get these recommendations on the record because I think that it is very important, and then we will do our best to ensure that there is action taken on these.

There's a tremendous amount of effort and work that survivors and experts went through when they came to speak at our committee.

We forget because we're here as members of Parliament. We're used to being in a committee room. We're used to speaking, but for somebody to come to Parliament and be asked to speak before a parliamentary committee, especially somebody who has survived a sexual trauma, or for people who have spent their lives as academics studying an issue, to give their testimony and to answer questions is a big deal. It matters, and a lot of preparation goes into that.

I would point to people like Professor Maya Eichler, who, when she came here, had her 10 minutes to be able to present. This is a professor who has literally devoted her academic study to the Canadian Armed Forces, military culture and gender issues. She had a tremendous amount to provide to this committee, but instead of allowing us to ask questions and have the interaction back and forth with her, again, there were games played, motions coming forward, and all she had was her 10 minutes.

I would very much like to make sure that some of the testimony and also things that witnesses, survivors and experts, have provided are at least on the record, right here, which will be in Hansard and is official. I will do this by reading them out. I do believe that I ended on the recommendation that self-monitoring is too reactive and inconsistent for the complex problem of sexual violence. I'll go to the next recommendation, which recommends addressing the use of sexually and racially coded language that supports and accentuates social hierarchies in the Canadian Armed Forces.

I think this one is very important. It does go to quite a bit of the testimony that we heard, and I spoke the other day about how these social hierarchies are established. It's rarely blunt. It does happen, but it's rare that somebody turns to somebody else, points at them and says, “You do not belong,” or makes an overt kind of comment that would indicate that a person does not belong, that a person is “othered”, that they are different. They do it through coded language.

I do think that it's interesting here that when putting these recommendations forward, survivors mention sexually and racially coded language because we cannot distinguish.... There are many people for whom intersectionality only duplicates and amplifies what they face.

Women have always faced discrimination within institutions, including in the military. If you are a transgender woman, you will face even more discrimination. If you are racialized, Black or indigenous, and a woman.... We add these layers of identity, and I think we can't necessarily distinguish because when people are choosing who belongs and who does not.... We heard from some of the witnesses the idea that there is a masculine normative toxic culture. It's the warrior concept. It's this idea that to be—and I mentioned this previously—a good soldier, a good aviator, a good sailor, there is a particular typecast that is assumed.

A lot of this is based on a not very modern way of looking at military. We know that in the military there are occupations across the board. I had the wonderful opportunity—I think it was three years ago—to be able to sail on the HMCS Winnipeg. We went from San Francisco to Esquimalt through the leadership program. This is something all members of Parliament are allowed to participate in. It's a wonderful way to get to know the day-to-day life of our sailors, who are doing tremendous work, and to really understand what that's like.

It was three nights on a ship. Very few people get to experience what life might have been had they chosen a different path. For three nights, I got to see first-hand, had I made a different choice in my life, had I chosen to go into the military, to join the navy, what it would have been like. It gave me a level of understanding, just sleeping in the bunk on the ship and eating with the sailors, and sitting down talking and listening to them.

I talked to women who were on that ship who were just returning home. They had been on the ship for six months. Being away from their families, being away from their children, the sacrifices that they make, but also the incredible sense of unity and camaraderie....

There's a recommendation coming up that talks about group loyalty. I think this is one of the things that makes it so hard when that's betrayed. I could see the close quarters. I could see that if somebody were in a situation where they were being sexually harassed—you can't avoid people on a ship. It really made a difference when we were sitting and talking. Different people and different ways of minimizing, diminishing or building up, building team and leadership can affect the entire group.

I'll talk a little bit later about some of the other experiences I had while on the HMCS Winnipeg, the people that I met there and how profoundly impressed I was. We were able to participate in fire drills. We were able to participate in rescues of somebody overboard. We were able to participate in many of the day-to-day activities. We saw the engine room. We saw the operations room. We did a simulated attack where we actually experienced what it would be like if the ship were hit by a torpedo. The table in the dining room turns into a surgical table. There are multiple uses for the space because space is very limited.

It was really an incredibly eye-opening experience that showed me that there are so many trades. There are so many ways to serve that aren't what you see on TV, that aren't what we see in pop culture.

Again, I reiterate this World War I notion of the soldier in the trench. There is so much more in today's military, and yet the way in which the stereotype, the normative of who will succeed.... It is still very much a masculine, heterosexual normative way of looking at it. Frankly, that is doing a disservice because it actually takes away the number of skill sets—men and women. I do think that it is very important to know that if there's a toxic masculinity that only favours a certain kind of masculinity over others, this is just as limiting and damaging to men who don't fit the stereotype as it is to women.

I go back to the recommendation that talks about sexually and racially coded language because I can only imagine, in an environment like that, when there are microaggressions, when there are comments made—and they can be very subtle comments, but they are ways in which people within the group navigate. I think we've all experienced it. I imagine anybody who is racialized, or a woman, or indigenous or LGBT, or anybody who has an identity that isn't part of the normative of the group that they're in has experienced this kind of thing.

I've certainly seen it in politics, where there are things that are...and I like the fact that it says “coded” because it is coded. It is a signal that somebody sends to someone else to say, that person is different; that person is other; that person does not belong here. It's a way in which to create the social hierarchies that Dr. Okros and others spoke to us about and provided testimony about.

Sometimes I think people don't even realize they're doing it. We hear things said, and we repeat them. I think that sometimes—especially for those who are in the dominant group—they may not even realize when they're using certain language, when they're using certain terms that have become so frequent, the harm and the impact that actually might have on other people in the group, who then are being told—not outright but day by day through little things, through microaggressions, through the words that are used, through the choice of terms—“You don't belong here. You're not part of the group.”

I've heard from some of the survivors that it can be even more damaging, that constant piling-on over time of these microaggressions, the language and the things that make you feel like you don't belong in a place that you've committed your life to, for something you believe in thoroughly. That's where the sense of betrayal, I think, comes in. You have people who believe profoundly in the group they are a part of, where the objective is the protection of Canadians, the bringing of peace and security in the world.

Going back to what I learned when I was on the HMCS Winnipeg, the work that they're doing—I mean, they've intercepted drugs in the Carribean. They've intercepted pirates off the coast of Somalia. They've participated in multiple multi-country efforts to make sure that we are safe and secure on so many levels, things that we wouldn't even know about. Honestly, I think we should probably talk more about some of the successes, the things our military members do that make our day to day lives safer. I don't think that people who have a family member who is struggling with drug addiction realize how many drugs are intercepted and stopped from getting here, to North America or Canada, because of the military. That's something that, when we look at young people thinking about their career....

I was talking to a young woman whose brother is an addict. She has had real difficulties with that. She said, “I want to be a social worker because I want to make a difference, and I want to make sure that other people don't become addicts, that they have services.” That is wonderful, I think, that giving back and the fact that this young woman wants to be a social worker, but would she ever even have thought that perhaps if she joined the navy that might actually be another way to stop the drugs from getting here and stop things like what was happening with her brother? I don't know if she would have thought of that as a way of giving back, because we don't know the stories. We don't know all of the different things that the military does, and part of that is because of this stereotype.

You know, when you watch TV, you look at a lot of the shows that portray the military. I'll confess, I watch a lot of them myself. This is a genre that I quite like, but just like I asked a friend of mine who is a doctor, “You know, I've watched 11 seasons of Grey's Anatomy. Does that make me qualified?”

She said, “It certainly doesn't make you qualified to be a doctor, but...”. Anyway, she made a joke that I'm not going to repeat, but it's the same thing with political shows.

We all know that when we watch these political shows, they don't reflect the reality of what it is to be an elected member of Parliament. In the same way, I think a lot of the shows and pop culture that portray a life in the military are not a full picture of what life in the military is. You do see in pop culture this racially and sexually coded language. You do see a lot of the stereotypes.

I think Hollywood is getting better at trying to show a little bit more.

I watch SEAL Team and I noted that recently they dealt with an issue about sexual harassment on a ship. They had one of the characters step in and speak out for somebody. She herself had experienced it and then she saw it happening to someone else on the ship. She stepped because she was an officer and had more power than she had at the time that this had happened to her.

They showed the backlash, the retaliation and some of the challenges that they had. When more women spoke out, when somebody who had some power at that point, an officer, defended somebody who didn't have power, who was more junior, they faced a backlash, and other women spoke out. Because of that, in that show anyway, it started to make a difference. They've dealt I think with other issues as well.

I think you're only now seeing that and you're seeing it because it's reflecting what is really happening. However, for a lot of the pop culture, for a lot of what we see when children look at, what do I want to be when I grow up, and they look at soldiers and they look at TV and Hollywood, I don't think it is inclusive.

It's getting better. I gave the example in the show SEAL Team where they've also tried to deal with issues about PTSD and veterans, and I think that's a good thing, but it's only very recently that Hollywood is starting to portray some of these issues that really happen.

I think it is really still the norm in our mindset, which is why there's the sexually and racially coded language, the social hierarchies, the portrayal of military in only a very aggressive masculine warrior kind of way, whereas leadership as we know is much broader than that. That's not to say that you don't need those skill sets, but we need to see it a lot more broadly.

That's why I think that particular recommendation is so important, but I do see that there are many other hands up, so I will allow my colleagues to have a say before I come back and go through some of the other recommendations.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you very much.

We go on to Mr. Baker, please.

[Yvan Baker, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thanks very much, Madam Chair.

I wanted to speak because I wanted to return to the focus of what I think Mr. Bagnell's amendment is designed to achieve. It clearly suggests that, at the very least, we should be asking for a government response to the report that this committee produces. I wanted to speak to some of the reasons I think that's important.

One of the things that I think is critical in light of the challenges facing the armed forces is making sure not just that good ideas or solutions get proposed but that they get acted upon. Requiring a government response is something that helps ensure that legislators like us, when we put forward those recommendations, those solutions to problems that we are trying to tackle.... Actually, government has a responsibility to indicate to us and to Canadians how they plan to proceed on those.

I think it's important that we hold this government and future governments to account on their actions on this issue. The problem of sexual harassment and sexual assault in the military is a long-standing problem. I think you all know this. It has transcended government after government. There are a lot of reasons why this has happened, but during that period of time, there have been many good ideas brought forward, many people who have advocated and many survivors who have courageously spoken up to alert people to the problem and to try to solve the problem.

Of course, there are many reasons why this issue has not been addressed and why it has not been solved. One of them, I think, is that we need to make sure that this is signalled as a priority by MPs of all stripes to the government of the day, whichever government happens to be in power.

This report is our way to convey our advocacy, to convey our point of view, to try resolve the issue of sexual harassment and sexual assault before us. This is our primary tool as a committee. I think it's powerful, especially if it comes from the committee itself; and if all members of the committee work towards a consensus to write that report, I think it has a powerful impact.

Putting that aside for a moment, making sure that the government actually responds to it is incredibly important because (a) it's what we know we can expect from government; (b) we can signal if we disagree with what government is doing; and (c) we can hold government to account for its actions against its own stated intention when it responds to our reports.

I wanted to reinforce how important I think Mr. Bagnell's amendment to Mr. Bezan's motion is. Members of this committee will know that I've relied quite a bit during this debate on this amendment, on Mr. Bezan's motion, on trying to do my best to give voice to the point of view of survivors, of victims. It's helpful to refocus if need be, certainly to focus ourselves and others who are watching this, reading the transcripts and studying what we're debating here and what it is we should trying to solve.

Who is it we should be trying to help? Who are the people who are suffering and going unhelped? They are the victims of sexual harassment and sexual assault in the armed forces. As you know, I've tried to do my best to give voice to their points of view, especially in the testimony that a number of survivors and experts have provided to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women.

One of the people I was speaking about in our prior meeting was Ms. Batek, who is a survivor. She testified at the status of women committee as a representative of the Survivor Perspectives Consulting Group, SPCG. SPCG was created by a small group of military sexual trauma survivors. They've come together to help address this problem, to ensure survivor voices are heard and to help create solutions.

Members will likely recall that at our prior meeting, I read some of the testimony that Ms. Batek provided to the status of women committee on the kinds of help that she and her colleagues could offer to government, the military, MPs and so on in trying to tackle the problem. I highlighted Ms. Batek's testimony for a number of reasons. One of them was that I felt it was an excellent example of the type of perspective that we need in our report and work here at the Standing Committee on National Defence. We need to hear their voices, which is why I'm giving them a voice in this debate, but we also need to heed their advice.

Ms. Batek alluded to a number of the complexities and issues that have to be tackled to stop sexual harassment and sexual assault in the military. I highlighted them because it was important that we take note of the work ahead, how complex this is, how much work is involved and how much expertise is needed to solve it. The expertise of people like Ms. Batek and others, especially survivors, needs to be at the centre of not just who we're trying to help, but whose help we need to solve this problem.

That is why I feel so strongly that we need a report that's written based on the consensus of members of this committee, just as reports are written at every committee on every issue. We need to make sure that we speak with one voice. I think that's important.

I also think it's very important that we acknowledge these issues and that what's contributing to sexual assault and sexual harassment in the military is going to require our best. We'll need to put our best foot forward to resolve this, because it's complex and nuanced. To understand that complexity, the nuance and what has to be done, we need to understand and bring into our report recommendations like those provided by Ms. Batek, her colleagues and other survivors.

I want to share with you something that Ms. Batek said in her testimony to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. She spoke to the impact of what's happening. She said:

A sexualized military culture, in many cases, may lead to military domestic violence, child abuse and civilian sexual assault. Not only does this culture provide a safe place for perpetrators to hide and exist under the protection of a uniform, but it also inadvertently teaches the victims to tolerate the intolerable, which leads to lives plagued with mental health challenges, potential homelessness and future abusive relationships.

The social cost of allowing this toxic culture to survive extends to the Canadian public, and that makes this a Canadian problem, with real financial and social costs affecting all taxpayers.

I want to pause there. Rightly, we focused our discussions and debates on the impact that sexual assault and sexual harassment have on CAF members, and I think what Ms. Batek is raising is very important to take note of. It is one of the things we should be considering as we're writing the report. One of the reasons that Mr. Bagnell's amendment is so important is that getting government responses to how it's going to address all elements and impacts of this problem is important.

In this particular case, Ms. Batek is speaking about how the sexualized military culture can lead to a whole series of issues outside of the military, most immediately in this case for the families of members of the armed forces who are impacted by the sexualized military culture. She talks about domestic violence, child abuse and civilian sexual assault, so this committee can't allow itself, in my view, to put out a report that just ticks the box that allows us to say we wrote our report if it doesn't take into account this very issue, particularly when we haven't thought about, considered, debated and understood the nuance of how the families of CAF members and how others in civilian life are being impacted by what's happening in the military. We can't do that if each MP is only given two minutes to speak. It's just not realistic. It has taken me more than two minutes to explain this problem and to convey Ms. Batek's point of view.

Her words and concern are about the social costs of allowing this toxic culture to survive, and extending that to the Canadian public is something we need to take heed of. I think we need to make sure that our report and the government's response take note of that and have solutions to address it. What are those solutions? We could debate that. I have some thoughts on it and I'm sure members of the committee have thoughts about it, but that's the discussion we need to have. That's the consensus that all members of this committee need to build if we're going to get to recommendations that are in the best interests of survivors and of members of the Canadian public who are impacted in the way that Ms. Batek has explained.

Ms. Batek went on in her testimony to say:

...when Lieutenant-General Eyre testified before this committee on March 23, he explained that his approach to changing the sexualized military culture was based on two streams, the second of which included listening and learning. This is exactly where SPCG fits in.

I want to pause there for a second because I think there's an important point to be noted from what Ms. Batek is saying. She highlights Lieutenant-General Eyre's testimony before the Standing Committee on the Status of Women, and I know that Lieutenant-General Eyre testified at this committee as well. What she chose to underline in this part of her testimony was that a key component of his approach, in one of the two streams that he indicated were important, was listening and learning. If that's something Ms. Batek thought important to highlight in her testimony to the committee, it's worth underlining here at this committee too. As we think about the motion by Mr. Bezan, the amendment proposed by Mr. Bagnell and how we move forward, we need to listen and learn and apply that listening and learning.

It's not okay for us to sit here and say we heard the witnesses and move on. It's not okay to suggest that we shouldn't hear from the perspectives of survivors. It's quite the opposite. We should be listening and learning and then applying that. If we don't listen, that is, to me, beyond reprehensible. If we just listen and don't learn, it is the same. To me, it is unforgivable that we're not going to listen and learn and then act on what we listened to and what we learned.

I guess I'm urging members of the committee to do that. I think the people like Ms. Batek who testified before our colleagues are urging us to do this. They are offering their expertise and advice, and I think we need to make use of that expertise and advice. The only way we can do that as a committee is if we actually put it into our report and get the government to respond to it, as Mr. Bagnell has urged us to do.

Ms. Batek went on. After talking about the listening and learning, she said:

This is exactly where SPCG fits in. Our team can provide the perspectives needed to ensure that every strategy, every plan, every policy and every program aimed at tackling this crisis is viewed through a survivor-informed lens.

Is our work informed by a survivor-informed lens?

If we're not willing to take the time to hear what the survivors have said, to understand and to learn from what they have said, if we're not willing to take the time to document what they have said and what they have advised government to do, in a thoughtful way, if we're not willing to do all of those things and then hold government to account to act on those things, then we're not taking a survivor-informed lens. We're not tackling this crisis that the survivors have faced and so many other people are facing as we speak.

I share that to say, let's take a survivor-informed lens. Let's make sure we take into account what they have to say, and their advice and their expertise and their solutions, the solutions they have brought forward and others have brought forward, and let's write a fantastic report that we can be proud of, that Canadians can be proud of, and most of all that survivors can be proud of.

Thanks very much, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Karen McCrimmon]

Thank you, Mr. Baker.

We'll go on to Mr. Spengemann, please.