National Defence Committee on Nov. 6th, 2025

[Tim Watchorn, Liberal, Les Pays-d'en-Haut, QC]

The government is responsible for sending the message that it supports victims to ensure that the majority of people understand this.

Is that right?

[Charlotte Duval-Lantoine]

Yes. That's right.

I'll repeat my earlier comments. This legislation won't prevent sexual violence from occurring within the Canadian Armed Forces. This process will be really necessary to make effective progress within the Canadian Armed Forces.

[Tim Watchorn, Liberal, Les Pays-d'en-Haut, QC]

Thank you.

Mr. Drapeau, we had the opportunity to chat briefly before the committee meeting began. You told me a bit about your concerns regarding the transfer of research outside the country.

How will the military services make the connection?

In practical terms, how will they preserve the evidence in order to take civil action when the files return to Canada?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

First, I have serious doubts about the competence and experience of military police officers when it comes to conducting investigations in this area.

If Bill C‑11 is passed, these military police officers will lose the experience gained from investigating crimes committed on Canadian soil. Military judges and the military police will have considerably less experience, and they already don't have much.

The victims outside the country will fall into a somewhat grey area. They may not know how the police or judicial authorities will handle their complaints, if at all.

I've represented a number of these victims. I have my doubts, particularly in the case of victims assaulted outside the country. For example, one woman was raped in a European country where Canadian forces were deployed. When she was sexually assaulted, there were no female medical staff available to take care of her and no rape kit on site. She couldn't be given the opportunity to collect evidence.

She was sent back to Canada, a process that took three or four days. In the end, her complaint was never followed up. There was never any trial. No police investigation took place. She has been living with this ordeal ever since, without even a modicum of justice from the military justice system.

[The Chair, Liberal, Charles Sousa]

Thank you, Mr. Drapeau.

Mr. Savard-Tremblay, you have six minutes.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all the witnesses for participating in our study. I also want to thank them for their remarks.

Mr. Drapeau, I'll make the connection between your comments and the transfer of jurisdiction set out in the bill.

I think that we all agree that it's a good idea to take away the military's ability to set its own rules in this area in order to avoid conflicts of interest. You personally criticized the excessive concentration of power in the hands of the judge advocate general.

In your opinion, is the imbalance caused by this concentration of power still being corrected? Does the minister have too much power?

I gather that we're transferring this jurisdiction to the ministerial power because we no longer want the military to have it.

That said, is it a good idea to put this in the hands of politicians?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

Yes, it's a good idea.

It's high time that Parliament addresses this issue. This has been done. It sends an important message to the military justice system and to military leaders. They must understand that they don't have full control over the administration of justice in cases involving military members both in Canada and abroad.

It will also send a message to society as a whole. Military members are recruited from this society. In the event of an incident such as sexual assault, the victim should be treated with a minimum level of respect. This doesn't happen under the current system.

Furthermore, the investigation should be conducted by an independent police force and an independent justice system that includes experts. These aren't my words. These are the words of Ms. Deschamps, Ms. Arbour and Mr. Fish.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

In 2021, you recommended the creation of the position of inspector general of the armed forces.

Given Bill C‑11, does this recommendation still stand?

Is it still relevant?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

Yes, Canada should appoint an inspector general who can take charge of the situation. This person would listen to victims and would have an open mandate. The person could do whatever seems necessary to investigate. The person would also be mandated to report to various individuals, including members of Parliament, as needed.

A number of countries in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO, have a similar position. As Justice Létourneau recommended during the commission of inquiry into the deployment of Canadian Forces to Somalia, specifically with regard to the Canadian Airborne Regiment in Somalia, I believe that an inspector general position should definitely be created.

If it were up to me, I would implement this today.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Do you have a better idea of which entity would be responsible for appointing this inspector?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

It would be Parliament. The person would report directly to Parliament, probably to this committee.

We hope that this person will be a type of “Maytag repairperson”. The person's mere presence and ability to investigate in the various military formations could have a deterrent effect.

In the event of a serious incident where a victim must bypass the chain of command to file a complaint, the investigator would be empowered to receive the complaint, investigate and take appropriate action.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Good to know.

Should the creation of this position be included in Bill C‑11?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

If I were a member of your committee, I would recommend it.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Thank you for the recommendation. We're here to study Bill C‑11 and to see how we can improve it. I'm sure that all the committee members, regardless of their political affiliation, will take your idea into consideration.

You referred to Justice Deschamps' report and to Justice Arbour's report. Those reports described a culture of complacency. I think that this goes without saying. The evidence is there.

That said, could we consider implementing accountability mechanisms, particularly in this area?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

You could certainly consider it.

As I said, I have serious doubts about how sexual crimes committed outside the country will be handled.

As for cases involving sexual crimes committed in the country and referred to civilian police and judicial authorities, I don't think that any further specific reports are necessary.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Bill C‑11 would completely remove the Canadian Armed Forces' jurisdiction to manage this issue. I think that this also falls in line with your recommendations. Everyone here agrees on this. However, military involvement could still be considered, particularly when it comes to securing evidence and making arrests.

How can we ensure that no grey areas remain when we remove this jurisdiction, a removal that we all support?

How can we ensure that, in practice, these grey areas won't affect the investigations conducted by civilian authorities?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

If an inspector general position is created, this person could conduct an investigation when the alarm sounds and their services are requested.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Bill C‑11 proposes to remove sexual offences from the jurisdiction of the military justice system. However, it retains the military justice system's jurisdiction to try individuals for other serious offences, such as acts of violence, abuse of power and non‑criminal harassment.

My colleague asked a question earlier about Quebec's approach to this issue. We were told that sexual assault was a different type of crime and that it required a level of sensitivity not generally found in the justice system.

Nevertheless, would it be a good idea to keep non‑sexual offences within the jurisdiction of the military justice system?

[Col (Ret'd) Michel Drapeau]

I think so.

Military members may be deployed to theatres of operation abroad. For centuries, history has shown that a proper justice system must accompany troops to these locations.

This was certainly the case during the Second World War and during the deployment of Canadian troops to Korea. It will likely also be the case when military operations take place in the future.

In my opinion, the military members need this internal justice system to ensure that justice is served without having to bring all the accused individuals and witnesses back to Canada every time a trial must take place.

[The Chair, Liberal, Charles Sousa]

Thank you, Mr. Drapeau.

Mr. Kibble, you have up to five minutes in this second round.

[Jeff Kibble, Conservative, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here and for bringing your expertise on such an important topic.

Mr. Drapeau and Mr. Fowler, thank you for your service to Canada.

Justice Deschamps' recommendation eight, with regard to civilian and military prosecution frameworks, recommends allowing victims—I prefer to use the term “survivors”—the choice to request civilian or military prosecution.

Mr. Fowler, could you speak to that? I've heard from multiple survivors that they are seeking this as an option for Bill C-11.

[LCol (Ret'd) Rory Fowler]

What we have to remember, and I think people forget this, is that for the past 25-plus years since the enactment of Bill C-25, which provided jurisdiction under the code of service discipline for sexual misconduct arising in Canada, victims, survivors and complainants—whatever term you want to use—have always had that option. There's been concurrent jurisdiction since 1999 for people to bring their complaints to the military justice system or the civilian criminal justice system.

As I've said before several times, the first decision-maker when it comes to enforcement of criminal law relating to sexual misconduct is not a government decision-maker, it's not an investigator, it's not a prosecutor and it's not a lawyer. The first decision-maker is the complainant himself or herself—the victim or the survivor. As it stands right now, notwithstanding policies that have been promulgated by previous ministers of national defence, the complainant gets to choose whether the process is going to be in the civilian criminal justice system or the military justice system.

Bill C-11 takes that option away from them. The fact is that many complainants and survivors went to the military justice system, and some to this day say they'd prefer to go to the military justice system because it makes sure the military is informed of their complaint and can take action. They are going to be deprived of that because of Bill C-11. We have to remember that the code of service discipline doesn't operate as an independent silo; it operates in a larger mosaic of enforcement within the Canadian Forces along with other disciplinary regimes and along with other administrative regimes.

I will tell you right now that if the military justice system is deprived of prosecuting sexual offences arising in Canada, the chain of command will still feel compelled to act. The only problem is that they're going to be using those tools available to them that are ill-suited to prosecuting sexual misconduct. They're going to use administrative reviews under DAOD 5019-2 to prosecute allegations of sexual misconduct, and those aren't suited to testing contested evidence.

What Bill C-11 is going to do is tell those survivors who want the military justice system to deal with their complaint to go elsewhere. When people are dissatisfied with the civilian criminal justice system and the outcomes there, what then?

[Jeff Kibble, Conservative, Cowichan—Malahat—Langford, BC]

Thanks, Mr. Fowler.

If I may follow up on that, since December 2021, criminal offences of a sexual nature have been transferred to civilian courts. Have you seen any data on how many cases have been sent to the provincial system? Do you know if any of those have been thrown out because of the Jordan framework?

[LCol (Ret'd) Rory Fowler]

There's relatively little public data. I know the Canadian Forces are tracking this. They're not making it public; one questions that, if the whole point of this is transparency. Cases have been rejected because of delay, including some high-profile ones.

For those of you who remember the prosecution of Lieutenant-General Trevor Cadieu in Kingston, which is where I'm from, that prosecution was stayed for delay. Justice O'Brien of the provincial court of Ontario, who was the presiding judge, delivered a judgment that was scathing about the conduct of the military police in continually dragging their heels on providing disclosure to the Crown. This then prevented the Crown from disclosing that to the defence counsel. To add insult to injury, the then Canadian Forces provost marshal attempted to blame the Crown attorney for the delay when the delay was very clearly due to the military police.

There's a consistent theme throughout many of the prosecutions that have gone sideways, both in the military justice system and in the civilian criminal justice system involving members of the Canadian Forces. Those are failures by the military police.

Bill C-11 isn't going to fix that. It does need to be fixed. My colleague Colonel Drapeau has mentioned some of the failings of the military police.

[The Chair, Liberal, Charles Sousa]

Thank you, Mr. Fowler.

Ms. Lapointe, you have five minutes.