Status of Women Committee on Dec. 4th, 2012

[Sana Hassainia, NDP, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

So there is a part that deals with sexual harassment.

[Alain Gauthier]

Yes, that is part of the course.

[Sana Hassainia, NDP, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

Okay.

How do you think that the new policy on harassment prevention will help employees?

[Alain Gauthier]

I noticed that two DAODs have been updated. Once again, the policy is fine. It is the way it is applied that makes the difference. Once again, the change in culture has to continue to take place. They are certainly going in the right direction, but it will still take a number of years, if not decades, before we have a completely harassment-free workplace.

[Sana Hassainia, NDP, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

Is there a way to assess how effective the courses are?

[Alain Gauthier]

No.

[Sana Hassainia, NDP, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

Thank you.

Is there a way to set up a mechanism to assess how effective the courses are once they have been offered? Does real visible change take place?

[Alain Gauthier]

In the Canadian Forces, it is a challenge to get a clear idea of the total number of cases. The Canadian Forces have mentioned that they work with three separate databases. So it is very difficult to get the same number of cases every time we ask about it. The Canadian Forces are in transition and they have to put all their data in the same database. Once they do that, we will have a better idea of how big the problem is.

[Sana Hassainia, NDP, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

What procedures does the School of Public Service use to address harassment issues? Are those procedures also followed in cases of sexual harassment?

[Alain Gauthier]

Procedures have been set up. The guidelines established by the Department of National Defence clearly mention that the first thing supervisors have to do in a case of sexual harassment is to separate the people as quickly as possible, to determine whether it is really a case of sexual harassment based on the facts and to follow up with an investigation.

However, that is not always what happens. The policies are in place and the structure is there, but their application may vary, which has caused a problem in the cases that have been brought to our attention.

I don't have an insight into all the current cases. We can only know about cases when people decide to call us to report a problem and to tell us that something is wrong. That is when they ask us to provide them with guidance or to help them.

[Sana Hassainia, NDP, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, NDP, Marie-Claude Morin]

Thank you.

We will now hear from Ms. Young, who has five minutes.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Thank you so much for coming in and for providing us with so much more detail on the differences.

One of the things I wanted to ask you about was Bill C-15. It appears that we're trying to better align the criminal court with the civil court. Therefore, can you explain that to us a bit more? What are the objectives and how are they being implemented through your system?

[Alain Gauthier]

I'm not sure I understand the question.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

I'm talking about clause 50 and the amendment that it includes of Bill C-15. It's amending the military court to better align or be more in line with the civil courts. I'm just asking you how this is being integrated or changed within the system as you know it.

[Alain Gauthier]

That would be totally outside of my realm. One of the things we don't do is necessarily look at the discipline piece of the military. Most of the issues the office looks at are the administrative pieces—finance, posting, harassment pieces, all this stuff. As soon as it becomes disciplinary and in court, it's outside of our mandate and outside of our box. We deal with very few, if any, of those cases. I have no visibility on that specific clause and Bill C-15 for that effect.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Really? That's very interesting. Is it a specific omission, then, that you're not part of that, and that it's not included in your mission or mandate?

[Alain Gauthier]

It's not part of the mandate.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Looking at the system of how the military court deals with harassment is not part of your mandate?

[Alain Gauthier]

Harassment is, but within the harassment piece, once again, as I've said, we're fairly limited in looking at the process and the procedural fairness of the harassment piece.

We cannot review a case and say that our decision would have been different. We cannot say, “Here's what we think at the office of the ombudsman. You should have supported this, and this is our recommendation for the consequences.” We cannot do that.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Given that clause 50 talks about the public access and openness of the court, and clauses 47 and 48 talk about who's on the court martial panel—and I could go on about different clauses—you're saying that you have no part in that or—

[Alain Gauthier]

None at all.

Actually, there's a specific clause in our mandate that prevents us from looking at what the Military Police Commission is doing. Anything that is of a criminal nature, we're not looking at it. Everything dealing with discipline or criminality is clearly outside of what the office is looking at.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

That's very interesting.

So when clause 62 talks about sentencing, you have no input into how the sentencing happens or the length of that—none, zero?

[Alain Gauthier]

Zero.

[Wai Young, Conservative, Vancouver South, BC]

Oh. So if somebody were to go through the system and appeal it, you would still have no input into that?