In the initial circumstance, I would really wish that Stuart had been seen as a mental health problem—and I hate those words, but he needed help—rather than as a discipline problem.
This incident when he was at the duty desk really sticks in my mind. There were a bunch of cadets in the base. He asked if he could go and help out. Now, this is a soldier who has served overseas. He represented Canada and the United States, because he was a really good gunner on the tanks. He represented them there. He had a lot of accomplishments, and all of a sudden he wasn't even good enough to go and help with the cadets. That really hurt. That was the day he killed himself. There was a funeral for another soldier that he wanted to attend. He wasn't allowed to do that.
Their default position was “We have this guy, he's living behind the duty desk, and we're going to get rid of him.” I think he could have been saved. All he really wanted was to return to being a good soldier.
Paragraph 98(c) is a little-known section in there. When I found out about this, I was absolutely astounded. What do you mean, you have a soldier who is sick and you're threatening him with life imprisonment? I'm not quite sure how that saves anybody, and the message it sends to everybody else is awful. When other soldiers see a soldier struggling, they really are scared to put their hand up. There's a stigma attached still to all of this. I think mental health professionals' number one message is “It's okay. Come on in. It's fine. We are going to help you,” not “Come on in, and by the way, we need to start the paperwork to do something else.”