Status of Women Committee on April 16th, 2013

[Dr. Jennifer Berdahl]

I would echo that we're long overdue some national statistics on this.

In addition, Status of Women Canada can offer guidelines and definitions of the problem and the nature of it, by defining sexual harassment broadly in the way that I tried to communicate to the committee, pointing out that the very overt sexual forms that we can all recognize are only the tip of the iceberg and that this is a systemic problem that affects both women and men in the workplace.

Where you see men being teased about their masculinity, you can be sure it's going to be a hostile place for women. Men are going to have to start reporting and stepping up to this as well, if the problem is going to be solved.

Outlining best practices and policies, providing that kind of information for companies if it's not already done, would be most helpful, such as on the importance of bystander intervention. We know a lot about how effective that is against bullying in schools. Why not do that in organizations? We need bystanders not simply being given the choice of intervening, but actually being told that it is their responsibility as citizens to intervene and stand up.

We need to provide victims multiple channels of reporting, starting with informal ombudspeople, instead of their having to go directly to a formal complaint, which we know is extremely rare and that people hesitate to do for good reason.

I thought Sandy's comment about filing complaints and telling organizations was not a bad sign but a good sign. That would be another example of best practices and policies, as well as emphasizing the importance and the responsibility of leadership in this problem.

I'm wondering about some kind of external organizational support system, because naturally if there's a sexual harassment problem within the organization, the leadership typically is somehow condoning it, which is why victims are not reporting it and are hesitant to say anything. So having some kind of organizational support that can give victims legal information and options and best practices for how to handle the situation, in addition to social support, connecting victims from other organizations, is really important, so that they know they are not along and that other people experience this too. People are divided within their own organization, so people typically don't go to each other within them when there's a problem. So connecting people in that kind of a social support network would be really important.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Thank you.

Professor Welsh.

[Dr. Sandy Welsh]

Thank you.

I will echo many of the comments that you've just heard. In terms of data, there was a time when Status of Women Canada was more involved in data, research, and reports. At one point I participated in writing a chapter for a report for Status of Women Canada on the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

I would encourage involvement in some of those issues where they are relevant, particularly in terms of surveys or qualitative data collection. The federal government, I know, does collect some of their own data, but it's important to either open up that data to researchers such as Jennifer and me in universities or to allow us to participate in collecting national data so we can have a baseline to understand where things are, if are we improving, and if new things are popping up.

Second, I would agree with the comments around Status of Women Canada's role in terms of defining the question and opening up the question, opening up the concept of what we consider harassment. It's not just about women; it is about men. There's a variety of different types of behaviours, as Jennifer has spoken to.

Also we need to deal head-on with the issue of what is referred to intersectionality: how citizenship status, racialized status, religion, and family status all come and intersect and create different forms of gender-based harassment that people are experiencing and how these connect, not just in the experience.

I think this would be my third point, in terms of the reporting of harassment. I know recently the Canadian Human Rights Commission has taken some steps to provide some guidelines on how to deal with intersectionality around gender-based issues. But it's important that some of the women we talked to in our Ontario study said, “Well, I'm a black woman so it's not really sexual harassment for me, but it's not really racial harassment. Maybe I shouldn't report it.” But I think it's for us to understand as researchers, as employers—

[The Vice-Chair (Mrs. Tilly O'Neill Gordon), Conservative, Tilly O'Neill-Gordon]

Thank you.

Moving on to Ms. James.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to all of our guests for being here through conference.

My first question is directed to Ms. MacQuarrie.

In your opening remarks you mentioned that one of the keys to dealing with sexual harassment in the workplace is prevention of future sexual harassment. I wonder whether you could speak directly to the benefits of early intervention when dealing with sexual harassment in the workplace, specifically how it ties into the leadership of any particular company. I know that other witnesses here today as well as in past meetings have spoken directly to the significance of good leadership, management, and supervisors. If you could speak to the benefit of early intervention, I would appreciate it.

Thank you.

[Barbara MacQuarrie]

Thanks for the question.

Early intervention is really key; it's really critical. I think it's unrealistic to expect that we'll never have inappropriate behaviours in a workplace. What we have to do is have that first line of defence, which is early intervention.

Early intervention sends a signal that this is not a place where we can act like that. It sends a signal that this is a place where we value everyone. It has to come first from leadership, but it has to move beyond leadership. It has to involve everybody in the workplace. Everybody in the workplace has to have that same sense that our workplace culture says, that our workplace culture absolutely requires, that everyone here is respected, that everyone feels safe, that everyone can contribute and reach their full potential as a worker in this environment. Early intervention sends all of those messages.

It also means that it's going to minimize the kind of disciplinary issues you're going to have. If you intervene early before things become serious, it's much easier to deal with the perpetrator. You don't have to implement really serious consequences. You can explain that this is inappropriate. You can give a warning. You can make it clear that the behaviour shouldn't be repeated. If you have the culture that supports all of that, you're not likely to see a repeat of the behaviour.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

We had before us another witness from the Canada School of Public Service, where they actually do mandatory training for supervisors and those in management positions. I wonder whether you have any opinion on what type of mandatory training you think works best. You hear things about doing it online, doing it person, that it has to be on an annual basis. I wonder whether you have any suggestions as to what you believe works best with regards to training supervisors and management leaders—I don't want to say upper management—in the workplace.

[Barbara MacQuarrie]

Was that question to me as well?

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Yes, it was. Thank you.

[Barbara MacQuarrie]

Thank you.

I really believe that you have to have some part of the training face to face. You have to start with the face-to-face training. That's definitely the most effective. You can have follow-up modules that are online, but if you don't get that face-to-face interaction, I don't think you can explore these relational issues.

Another training tool that works very well is the use of scenarios, whether they're videotaped scenarios or the use of theatre to mount real situations. Case studies are another effective tool. But having at least the introduction to the training be in person is critically important. You can't deal with relational issues in an electronic, online context effectively.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you.

I'm glad you actually mentioned scenarios. I still recall the commercials that ran across our TVs with regard to elder abuse, and being able to spot what is considered to be abuse of our senior citizens and so forth. Sometimes you'd be watching those commercials and you'd think, yes, that is abuse, but it doesn't really dawn on you until you actually see it and it's described to you. So I thank you for mentioning scenarios and giving actual examples of what would be deemed inappropriate and what is okay. So I thank you for that.

I'm going to ask Professor Welsh the next question.

In your remarks you talked about three different ways of preventing harassment, and you mentioned about easy access, where to go, a key point person, and so forth. We've actually heard from many witnesses prior to this talking about harassment advisers or go-to or point people in an organization, where you can go to that one individual. It's easy to know where to go, easy to access, and so on.

Do you think it's a good idea to have something like that in place?

[Dr. Sandy Welsh]

I think it is, and this is where universities in Canada are good examples. The University of Toronto, like other universities, has a sexual harassment officer who reports directly to the president. She does not report to a manager somewhere in the middle level of the managerial food chain, so to speak. It means that we have someone who is clearly identified for faculty, staff, students, who you go to. She's not going to feel somehow beholden to a manager who's sitting ahead of her. Having someone who maybe sits, in terms of their harassment responsibilities, a bit outside the normal chain of command is useful.

Jennifer spoke to multiple avenues of complaint. That's very important because who does the manager complain to when their manager is harassing them?

So I think it's about having point people who are appropriate to the organization, and having someone do that, yes.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you.

This question is for Professor Welsh as well. When you speak about multiple or different avenues, do you think it's important to be able to speak directly to a person, or perhaps be able to log a complaint or file something electronically, or perhaps pick up the telephone and be able to report it that way? Do you believe that there should be different avenues of how to report a particular problem or complaint?

[Dr. Sandy Welsh]

There need to be different avenues, because sometimes someone is not ready. If you put it in an e-mail, you do it electronically, and there's a record. What we heard in our study and what I hear in a lot of complaints I'm involved with is that women just want the harassment to stop. Sometimes what they would rather do is to talk to someone, get some advice on some strategies they can use, know that they have support, and then they can, either with their manager involved or on their own, try to move this forward, especially if it's low-level types of harassment.

But I think it's important that there be a way that someone can talk to someone, to say, “I think I have a problem. Could you help me define it?” or “I think I have a problem. Do you think I need to file a formal complaint?”, as well as someone who wants to do it electronically.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

I figure that my time has mostly gone. Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair (Mrs. Tilly O'Neill Gordon), Conservative, Tilly O'Neill-Gordon]

Thank you.

Now we'll move on to Ms. Sgro.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Good morning to all of our witnesses. Thank you so very much for the work you've done on this issue. Clearly, it's something that you're very well versed in and very much aware of.

Before I go on with my questions, Madam Chair, I just wanted to bring to the attention of our committee members the fact that if you check your inbox, you'll see that I have sent out an e-mail this morning. I'm holding a round table in Ottawa with some of the witnesses who weren't allowed to come to the committee and who have had first-hand experience in the RCMP on this issue of harassment. I'm having that on April 22, and certainly everybody in the committee is welcome to come. I plan to submit the testimony from that hearing to the clerk following the event.

My apologies to our witnesses. I had forgotten to mention that earlier. I wanted to make sure that everyone knew about it.

The issues of the RCMP, the rationale for starting this particular study, and many of the things that you have said today, all three of you, are some of the answers that the RCMP should have been responding to much earlier. They would not have found themselves in the situation that they are today with the kind of damage that has been done to their reputation, but most importantly, to the many women who have been subjected to this.

In particular, you mentioned the issue about having an outside organization to go to, with people who are experienced in regard to that kind of harassment. In a hierarchy like you have in the RCMP, all they had was to go to the next manager or to human rights or whatever. As something for the federal government to have, how would you see this outside organization, other than as just one of our normal community organizations that they could go to, an organization that the government would have confidence in to try to deal with those problems? Whoever would like to respond to that, please go ahead.

[Barbara MacQuarrie]

I can start. We explored a model here in London, which would have been at a municipal level, not a federal level, but I think the model could work. We were asking if a number of workplaces could come together, a number of federal workplaces, to actually provide funding for an office and staff. These people would be well versed in labour law and human rights law and would understand the dynamics of sexual harassment. They would be independent, but funded perhaps by the group of workplaces that would need to use them.

There would have to be a reporting structure, something that's maybe similar to what Sandy was talking about in the university, so there's not a reporting to middle managers, but rather reporting directly. That could be to the Prime Minister. This is a very serious issue, and if we want to show how seriously we're taking it, we need to set up those kinds of structures.

That's an idea I have, and I think that if you were to set up something like that, you could certainly look to experts in the field for advice, for input, and for direction. I know that many people would be happy to sit down and think about how to structure something like that in a way that would really make the most sense.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Professor Welsh?

[Dr. Sandy Welsh]

I would agree with Barb in terms of having a structure. One way to do it would be to work with people who have the legal expertise and the social support expertise, such as social workers, as well as others who have experience in going through these kinds of complaint procedures. That structure could somehow sit outside the RCMP or the federal government and work independently.

In some ways, it's almost like an ombudsperson kind of position, but it might be an ombudsperson who also has access to those kinds of resources, both legally and on the social support side. Given the complexity of identifying and naming the issue of harassment—it can be presented in so many ways—that might be one way to do that: to either piggyback onto an existing ombudsperson kind of position or to develop one that is more focused on harassment, respect in the workplace, and related issues.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Professor Berdahl?

[Dr. Jennifer Berdahl]

I would echo what has already been said, but I would add that having it funded by the companies using it might be problematic. It would nice and ideal if there could be some government funding for this, so that there is not any conflict of interest involved in the advice being given. It would also serve as a resource not just for victims, but also for leaders and managers who might be struggling with this issue in their organizations and may not know how best to address or handle it. It would be a sort of safe haven for both sides of the conflict to go to for good advice.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Professor Berdahl, your description of the individuals who tend to be the victims of harassment, whether male or female, describes very well, I think, members of the RCMP in particular. You talked about individuals who are outspoken and assertive. That's very much, I would suggest, what we've seen among women who are showing leadership in those areas, by joining the RCMP and advancing their own careers and being harassed by many of their fellow managers and so on. Yours was a perfect description of what we have heard in the case of the RCMP.

You mentioned the lack of leadership as well and said that it's a case of setting the tone to change the culture.

That's very difficult for an organization to do. Do you have anything else to recommend, over and above the comments you have made, that would deal with this kind of institution, which is male-dominated and highly respected by all of us, and which is struggling to make the changes? Have you had a chance to review any of the information they have put forward as to the kind of changes they plan to make within the organization?

[The Vice-Chair (Mrs. Tilly O'Neill Gordon), Conservative, Tilly O'Neill-Gordon]

Please keep your answer short, because we just have a few seconds.

[Dr. Jennifer Berdahl]

I'm aware that they're trying to address it. They have now made it such that people have to report relationships, etc., and sexual interactions within the organization. But I am not familiar with everything they have tried to do.

There are some very good examples of leaders—military leaders, even the dean of the Harvard Business School, which has historically faced some of the same issues—coming out and explicitly addressing the problem and making it top on their agenda. And the change is almost immediate. Of course, you still have some bad apples, but the barrel is not as rotten, and they're not going to thrive.