Status of Women Committee on May 23rd, 2013

[The Chair, NDP, Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe]

Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to call the 79th meeting of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women to order. We will now begin our proceedings.

We will spend the first hour speaking with Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk via videoconference. She is appearing as an individual and has already given her opening statement.

Ms. Benson-Podolchuk, thank you for appearing before the committee a second time, to give members a chance to ask you questions about your statement.

We will begin with members' questions, and we will hear from another witness during our second hour.

I would just like to let the committee members know that Ms. Bowes-Sperry wasn't able to join us today, even though we were hoping to hear from her. We will see whether we can invite her to appear next Tuesday, during our second hour.

On that note, I will hand the floor over to Ms. Truppe.

You have seven minutes.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

To the witness, thank you for coming back today so we have the opportunity to ask you some questions.

In your book Women Not Wanted, you mentioned that despite having experienced workplace harassment, it was only after taking the RCMP harassment workshop that you truly realized what you had been experiencing was actually harassment and sexual harassment in the workplace. Could you describe for us what this course was about that allowed you to realize that it was harassment?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk, As an Individual]

It became so normalized that I really believed everybody else, all other women, were treated the same way. In the class there was a group of us. It's funny, I was just talking to my partner yesterday about that. We broke off into little groups and we had to explain what an ethical dilemma was and also a situation that we experienced. Everybody else said something, and I thought that seemed fine and normal, but when I told them something that happened to me, their mouths just dropped to the ground and they couldn't believe it. They said, “Sherry, you're not supposed to put up with that. Didn't you know that?” In training they never told us anything about that. They didn't tell us that you have the right to say, “Don't do that”. They didn't tell us how to defend ourselves within the RCMP and within our own detachments when it came to harassment. What harassment could be was never, ever discussed. Specifically, they never talked about abuse of power either.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

How long were you an RCMP officer before you actually had any type of training?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

Oh, gee, I think it was—

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Or did you have any training before that particular time?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

The only harassment training I received was almost at the end of my service.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

How many years was that?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

I would say I had about 16 years in before I received my first harassment training workshop.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

That's a long time. You were in the RCMP for 16 years and that was the first time you had harassment training?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

Yes.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Was there training available and they just didn't give it to individuals who started later, so that new people were taking it, or was there no harassment training for anyone?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

When I joined in 1989, there wasn't anything. I believe probably over the years, as things sort of popped up within the....

In Canada and in the Canadian Forces, they were encouraging anti-harassment training at that time. The commissioner in the early 1990s said, “Well, we don't have a problem; we don't need that kind of training.”

However, I guess as lawsuits popped up and there were these whispers across Canada of harassment, they did begin to have harassment training, but I didn't receive any of it until later in my service.

I had asked for the training when I first saw some of these courses popping up, but because I was either off duty sick with my injury or stress leave, I was never given the opportunity. In training, though, I think they had started that.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

As we found out from some of the other witnesses, there is training for new hires and there is continuous training. This is part of what we want to find out. Just because you start in 1989, it doesn't mean you don't need training in 1999. There should be continuous training so that you're always apprised of what is harassment, of what is right and what is not right, even on the other end of the stick, the harasser as opposed to the harassee. There should be continuous training. I'm surprised that it was 16 years before you had your first workshop.

Would a confidential reporting process have helped? Would you have felt comfortable with that?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

Oh, that's funny, because in 2004, I think, when someone phoned me saying they were doing a confidential report on harassment in the RCMP, I said, “How much time do you have?” I rattled on to them for about 45 minutes. I asked them if anything was going to actually happen, and said, “Phone me at home, if you want, because I have another five hours, if you have the time.”

This was before I wrote my book. Now it would be easy just to mail my book and say, “Read it and then get back to me.”

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Would access to a designated workplace harassment adviser have helped? Again, we found with some of the witnesses we've had that some of them have designated workplace harassment advisers. If you have a problem, you go there. You don't necessarily have to go to your superior or anything if that makes you feel uncomfortable.

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

I think that's a good idea, but really, policies are only as effective as the people who enforce them. If you have a workplace adviser, that's wonderful. But if he or she goes to the next chain of command, and that person thinks these are just silly little complaints, then nothing will be resolved. Eventually that just becomes a toxic workplace.

The entire RCMP organization and federal government employees have to buy into this idea that having a harassment-free, bully-free workplace is in the best interests of everybody for the emotional and financial parts of an organization.

Think about it. People are on sick leave for five years. If they're getting paid $90,000, that's a lot of money. I think they would rather be working in a healthy workplace than sitting at home and stressing.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Yes, absolutely. I agree with you. It's not a good place for anyone to be in. We can all almost identify with what you're saying, but until it actually happens to one specifically, nobody really knows what you went through.

You mentioned that you've encountered other women who have had similar experiences to yours. In speaking with them, was it also training that caused them to label their experiences as sexual harassment, or did they know they were sexually harassed?

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

Some of those who have spoken to me are older, in their fifties or sixties, so this would have happened, like, 35 years ago. As a woman you sort of accepted it.

For some younger officers and civilians, with sexual harassment and gender imbalance becoming more well known, and the label becoming more known, there's a title to what's happening to them, and yes, they have identified it as sexual harassment or harassment in the workplace.

[The Chair, NDP, Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe]

You have only 10 seconds left.

[Susan Truppe, Conservative, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, NDP, Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe]

Thank you, Ms. Truppe.

We now turn to Ms. Hughes, for seven minutes.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Thank you very much.

Unfortunately, I wasn't here for your presentation, but I read it last night. I could actually relate to it, having worked in a workplace where I was sexually harassed.

I worked for probation and parole services, and I remember when the mandate came in for harassment training and everybody had to take it. I remember going to this one institution for that training and someone walked in and said, “I'm not sitting beside that person,” and took their chair and moved it away. I know how it feels and how that other person must have felt. Here we were in a harassment training course. It was already there and that poisoned environment just continued to build.

We know that it's not just the employees who need to take this training. Supervisors, managers, and everyone in the workplace should take these courses. Regardless of whether someone has taken a course or not, we continue to see these events take place.

With the recent story that broke involving Staff Sergeant Caroline O'Farrell, we see it's the same thing again. You and she had repeatedly mentioned this to your superiors and very little action was taken, or if action was taken, the victim was actually victimized again.

Many experts have agreed that one of the first barriers to reporting sexual harassment in the workplace is the fear of retaliation, which you have talked about, as has the staff sergeant. In the RCMP, have you seen the existence of a mechanism, effective or not, that aims to avoid and prevent reprisals? I am wondering if you have seen something like that.

[Sherry Lee Benson-Podolchuk]

There was nothing there, no. It took me a long time to find my voice and stand up to what was happening to me in my first detachment, because I knew there would be a negative impact right away, and I was not surprised, because there was.

Poor Caroline. My heart broke when I read the article in the paper yesterday. She's absolutely right. There isn't anything that would stop somebody from retribution. The policies are only as effective as the command and control, the people who are above the abuser. It goes all the way up to the top. If nobody is willing to say that the person is allowed to make a complaint and there's not going to be any negative impact.... I haven't seen anything and I don't know if they have anything in place at the moment.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

I worked in the justice field and you worked in the justice field. Some people tend to wonder how come they didn't know any better; how could they not recognize this; how could they not know their rights. The thing is that we do recognize it, but the more we speak out, sometimes that's when the retaliation comes in. I'm wondering if you know of any other women, aside from Caroline, who have been discharged and who have had similar experiences while serving in the RCMP.