Evidence of meeting #15 for National Defence in the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was civilian.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Master Warrant Officer (retired), As an Individual
Yes, sir. I believe that people need to be given that choice.
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
Ms. Wood, the first question is the same question: Have you had a chance to read Bill C-11?
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
That's fair enough; neither am I.
If you had a chance to remove the provisions that remove choice, would you make that change?
As an Individual
I support choice. I would never support removing choice.
I definitely believe we need the sunset clause on this to make sure that we can reassess the scope of this.
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
Ms. Van Leusden, my first question is the same for you.
Conservative
Director, Survivor Perspectives Consulting Group
I'm sorry. Yes, I have reviewed it. I am also not a lawyer, but I have reviewed it.
I would add the choice—the option. The only other thing I would want is that the people who are working in this area need to be trauma-informed to avoid 91-page decisions blaming the survivors for the outcome.
Conservative
Peer Support Advocate, United Federation of Canadian Veterans
I have read the thing from cover to cover. I went and got the legal dictionary out and I defined every single word and phrase in that bill.
We cannot remove choice, and we need to have trauma-informed people responding at the very first level. That's it.
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
Thank you very much.
Ms. Le Scelleur, have you had a chance to review Bill C-11?
Veteran and Ph.D. Candidate, As an Individual
I reviewed it in parts, the same as other people, because it's very legal-driven.
I agree that we need to change the wording and offer the choice. Definitely we also need to have people trained to be more trauma-informed.
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
Thank you very much.
Mr. Chisholm, you said something that struck me, and I'd like you to explore it a little bit. I believe you said that the system is geared toward conviction. Did I misunderstand what you said?
Master Warrant Officer (retired), As an Individual
No, sir. You can go on the SMSRC site and look at the decision tree, which is a tool for commanding officers and chiefs about what avenues to take. There is no way out. Even if the person is found not guilty, it goes to admin action. The revised document went the same way, and in the end... I was in policy in CPCC at the end, and I kept asking where the way out was for an innocent person.
Both the current decision tree and the amended one are geared toward a perpetrator, not an alleged perpetrator.
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
All of you have spoken, in particular Ms. Wood, about the military cultural awareness.
I was in the military as well. I don't think there's a lot of understanding out there among Canadians as to what that really means. I remember being a young officer with no clue about what was going on around me. In fact, I'd walk around with a coffee cup in my right hand, which is the wrong thing to do.
Conservative
Shelby Kramp-Neuman Conservative Hastings—Lennox and Addington—Tyendinaga, ON
Do you have to use your left hand?
Conservative
Scott Anderson Conservative Vernon—Lake Country—Monashee, BC
You have to salute. If you're saluted, you have to salute back and you can't.
Can you explain that a little bit, please?
As an Individual
Yes, I can try.
I think this is a crucial part of this. I'm looking at this mostly from the experiences of my father. As a judge in the civilian court system, he was routinely educated. He went to conferences to be kept up to date on legal developments. Given what a civilian judge has to do already in a year to keep up to date with everything, downloading this into their laps...and not just the judges but also the Crown prosecutors, the defence attorneys and everyone involved.
It is so hard to understand the language. It's so hard to understand the power dynamics. It is so difficult to have to explain it. I have to explain it often in therapy. My therapist is not from the military, so I have to explain all of these different things to them. It's exhausting. It's demoralizing. To prevent that from falling on the victim or the complainant in a process like this, the judges, the police, the prosecutors and the defence attorneys need that training regularly. They need the support. I guess they're called secondments. Increased co-operation, if that has to happen.... However, just downloading it.... I think we have one MOU signed with Ottawa. What about the rest of the provinces? What's happening? We need dedicated funding and resourcing.
November 27th, 2025 / 9:20 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Charles Sousa
Thank you, Ms. Wood.
Thank you, Mr. Anderson.
Ms. Romanado, you have five minutes.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
I'd like to thank the witnesses for being here.
If on any of my questions you would prefer to submit a response in writing later through the clerk, please feel free to do so. I'd be happy to have that.
This has been an incredibly helpful panel for us. It has also been very difficult for you to come and share your stories very publicly. However, it's actually very helpful for us to understand the application of this bill, should it go through, and how it would work. This is actually very helpful for us to get a better understanding about how this would work on the ground in real time.
I want to start with Ms. Wood.
You made an interesting recommendation, and you just followed up on that, in the sense that civilian systems don't really understand military life. I have a military family; I have children who are serving. We get the acronyms; we understand what they mean. We understand what an OUTCAN post is and so on. We also understand the culture. Having to explain that to a civilian who is not trained in military speak can be very difficult. It's difficult enough to report a sexual assault, let alone having to then try to educate the person when they ask, “Well, why didn't you leave?” “Well, I was actually on a ship. I couldn't leave.”
You mentioned perhaps putting it under the DND but not under the CAF. I thought that was quite interesting. Would you like to elaborate a little bit on how that could, perhaps, help eliminate the problem of not understanding the military culture, while also keeping it a little more independent? Could you elaborate a little bit so that I can understand how it would work?
As an Individual
I will definitely elaborate more in writing.
The way I think of this idea of the DND and the CAF.... This is probably a poor choice of words, but they're like cousins. They're of the same family, but they perhaps have different backgrounds, experiences and sets of expertise. I think there's a lot of potential to go down that road, but I really would want to give you a more fulsome answer in writing.
Liberal
Sherry Romanado Liberal Longueuil—Charles-LeMoyne, QC
That would be perfect.
What we've heard in testimony is that up until 1998, sexual assaults in the Canadian Armed Forces were investigated and prosecuted in the civilian realm. It was moved to the CAF in 1998, so that was from 1998 to 2021.
After speaking with over 14,000.... In Justice Arbour's review, she explained that you cannot remove that fear of reprisal and chain of command. It's basically the only employer in Canada that investigates and prosecutes itself. There's no other workplace in Canada where, if you were sexually assaulted, your supervisor would be investigating and prosecuting.
Removing that from the Canadian Armed Forces would eliminate that fear of reprisal, and the culture, perhaps, would change. We mentioned those indicators, those low-risk behaviours that are happening in the Canadian Armed Forces that sometimes result in sexual assault.
Would you agree that moving back into the civilian system could at least remove the fear of investigating yourself and the fear of reprisal? I don't know if anyone would like to respond.