Status of Women Committee on April 20th, 2021

[Lt(N) Heather Macdonald]

As for just me personally, not me as a member of the Canadian Armed Forces or in.... There are other countries that have inspectors general, which are completely aside from the minister of defence. We could put the sexual misconduct response centre under there. We could put our ombudsman under there. We could take the CFNIS and put them under there so that they actually have a trained police force that can investigate and a trained police force that is actually independent from military police and from the military. These are options we could choose that are completely separate.

For the actual CFNIS, it is like you're being interrogated and you're a criminal. I know that on civilian sides.... I shouldn't have to be depending on the person I'm talking to who's asking me questions to give me emotional support. When you're answering questions about this, there are going to be emotional side effects. Why couldn't I bring a service dog or something in there to provide the emotional support that I needed without having to rely on the person asking me questions for that? Why does that pervert justice? I don't think it does.

We should be thinking about these sorts of things in our processes, and we should also be making sure that they're all independent. These are just some of the things that I think could be options. I'm not sure.

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond Centre, BC]

Thank you very much.

Also, can I ask Aviator Tulloch that as well? Can you shed some light on this question? What options would you recommend?

[Emily Tulloch]

I'm sorry. Could you repeat the first part of the question, please?

[Alice Wong, Conservative, Richmond Centre, BC]

It's been mentioned that we need to conduct an options analysis. I recognize that you may not feel comfortable giving official recommendations, but since you are still serving, could you at least give us some of the options you think should be considered?

I applaud you for coming out for the first time to tell us your experience. I was really angry to hear that as early as your first month in serving it occurred and that you already had that terrible experience.

[Emily Tulloch]

It was quite a bad welcome to the military.

I think the options we have to really look at are training and recruitment.

In regard to the NIS, that was one of the interviews that did not go well for me. That was a person who.... I felt I wasn't being heard. I think we really have to take a step back and retrain these people who are supposed to be taking our stories, dealing with them and investigating them.

We really need to retrain them in how to be a people person. I know they have to be non-partisan, but it gets to the point that when a victim is telling you that they were raped or sexually assaulted, as much as you want to be non-biased, you still have to treat them like a person and not a case file.

When it comes to mental health, the military has to outsource a lot of the time. For example, I'm seeing a civilian therapist. I think the military should honestly take a step back and look at recruiting officers or other people into service who are therapists and psychologists who are actually professionally trained and have a degree to handle the aspects that sexual assault and sexual misconduct envelopes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

The final round of questions goes to Ms. Dhillon.

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to start by saying thank you so very much to our witnesses for being here today and for sharing these shocking and painful stories. It's very hurtful to hear that this can be happening in the Canadian Armed Forces. It's very true what you say, which is that it affects all of us as Canadians—every single one of us. All of us on this committee are thankful to you wholeheartedly. It takes a lot of courage and wisdom to come and share your experiences, despite being treated the way you were and shunned. Whatever you went through, you are here today. You are strong women. You are an inspiration to all of us.

I see how you went through these experiences and you continue to fight. You have undefeatable spirits. Thank you so much for your service to our country.

I'm sorry. I'm getting emotional. We all feel it. I see all my colleagues' faces on the screens. Thank you so much. Please never ever give up. We are here for you. One of my colleagues said that as politicians, but also as community we are here for you.

Ms. Tulloch, I'd like to start with you, please.

Can you please tell us a little bit about what you think is important for people to know? Especially women and those marginalized who are coming into the armed forces and who are in the armed forces, what message would you like to give them?

[Emily Tulloch]

When I was in basic, one of the master corporals told me this and it stuck with me. She said that when you put on this uniform, you feel like you have something to prove.

I just want to tell all these women, like my fellow servicewomen and people who are thinking of or have joined up, that you have nothing to prove to anybody. You have this uniform and you're wearing it because you chose to. The only person you have to make happy in this uniform is yourself. You have nothing to prove to anybody.

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

How has this experience impacted you in your family life, your personal life and professionally—those aspects of your life? Do you continue to experience PTSD?

Please, could you share with us? If anybody doesn't feel comfortable answering any questions, please feel free not to.

Thank you.

[Emily Tulloch]

In that sense, things have been rough. I have definitely, since coming forward.... It has been a wild roller coaster, and one that I did not want to be on.

In all honesty, as hard as it was, I am glad I went through it. I am, obviously, still going through it. I'm still seeing a therapist. I saw a psychiatrist a few weeks ago. It is something I have learned not to deal with, but just.... I have learned to put my emotions and my strengths into something else, which is doing this. Letting my story and my voice be heard is super helpful.

Everybody in my life—my family, everyone like that—has been super supportive. It's been so nice to know that when I call my dad at 2 a.m. crying, he's not going to judge me. He's going to let me complain for a little bit, and then give his dad advice. That's the nice part of it.

[Anju Dhillon, Liberal, Dorval—Lachine—LaSalle, QC]

It's beautiful when you can have family supporting you. My dad and I are very close, too. We're like friends. We can talk to each other about anything. I'm so happy you have this support. I pray to God that everybody can have this kind of support.

When they don't, is there anything that the victims or complainants can do to navigate this process better, the reporting process, and not be intimidated by it? Could you please share some best practices, some of your recommendations?

[Emily Tulloch]

There is a sexual misconduct response line. You can find the number online somewhere. It has tons of resources that can help. I wish I had known about this line. I only found out about it a couple of weeks after I reported. It has its own military police that can help. It has an option to have a third person, so you don't have to be in direct contact with the police.

Overall, it's a 24-hour helpline full of trained and registered nurses who can help you. I did it once, and she just listened to me cry for an hour and complain. It was so nice.

If you don't have that familial support, just reach out. Look at those little posters on the wall that nobody really looks at.

[The Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

That is excellent advice.

Thank you again to all of the witnesses. You've done a tremendous job today.

We are going to suspend briefly while we do the sound checks for panel two.

[The Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

We'll commence our second panel.

Welcome to meeting number 27.

Each of our witnesses will have five minutes for opening remarks.

We have Lieutenant-Colonel, retired, Bernie Boland; and Colonel, retired, Michel Drapeau, who is also a professor with the faculty of law at the University of Ottawa.

We'll start with you, Mr. Boland, for five minutes.

[Lieutenant-Colonel, Retired) Bernie Boland (As an Individual]

Madam Chair, thank you.

I'm Bernie Boland, retired lieutenant-colonel, who served honourably in the Canadian Armed Forces for over 30 years. For the past 12 years, I was an engineer in the public service. I retired in December 2020.

At the March 23, 2021, committee hearing, Minister Sajjan stated, “I take any allegation, regardless of rank or position, very seriously”, “We are committed to addressing all allegations, no matter the rank and no matter the position”, and “Sexual misconduct, harassment and inappropriate behaviour are not acceptable. We must call them out for what they are: an abuse of power.”

My testimony will present a concrete example of the difference between what DND practises and what it purports in addressing misconduct.

My case is comprehensively documented. The committee clerk has over 30 documents that chronicle the systemic and aberrant manner that senior executives who are commissioned to stamp out misconduct do not.

In the pursuit of justice, I followed the prescribed process. The defence officials assigned to assure that justice prevails robbed me of my right to advocate and denied me the opportunity to confront the offender in a balanced and equal justice for all, adversarial-based legal system.

In 2016, I reported wrongdoing and misconduct when an employee I had the privilege of supervising requested that I report the harassment and human rights violations perpetrated upon her by a senior engineering manager. I reported it. He was promoted. We faced reprisal and retaliation.

Her case is now at the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal awaiting adjudication on discrimination and deferential treatment due to age, gender, ethnicity and being a Muslim.

Once I reported the misconduct, I became an organizational threat. In retaliation, and to exonerate those responsible and culpable for the misconduct and human rights violations I reported, DND, in a formal departmental submission to the Canadian Human Rights Commission, secretly made me the scapegoat for the misconduct. I was made aware of DND's surreptitious actions by the woman harassed.

DND secretly making me a scapegoat was reprehensible, and I vehemently protested. On January 13, 2021, I formally submitted a complaint to Mr. Sajjan against the deputy minister, Jody Thomas, for condoning, as proper departmental conduct, DND's secret scapegoating of me.

Minister Sajjan's chief of staff acknowledged receipt of my complaint and assured me that it would be handled according to the applicable law. Jody Thomas is a Governor in Council appointee. No one from the Privy Council contacted me.

To ensure that my complaint against Jody Thomas did not drop off the radar, or more correctly wasn't institutionally ignored, I sent a February 7, 2021, registered letter containing my complaint against the deputy minister to Prime Minister Trudeau, with info copies to Katie Telford and the Clerk of the Privy Council, Ian Shugart. The letter's subject is “Defence Leadership Corrupts the Harassment Resolution Process to Protect the Harasser”.

No one from the PMO or Privy Council contacted me. However, Minister Sajjan's seriousness and commitment to addressing all allegations, regardless of rank or position, against the deputy minister, a Governor in Council appointee, was summarily and arbitrarily dismissed without investigation by Mr. Kin Choi, a subordinate of the deputy minister.

Though assured that the applicable law would be followed, Mr. Choi's expedient exculpation of his boss, Jody Thomas, broke the law. Specifically, Mr. Choi violated Bill C-65's workplace harassment and violence prevention regulations. Mr. Choi is responsible for the coordination and implementation of Bill C-65 in DND. He is also DND's functional authority for harassment prevention and resolution. Mr. Choi's conduct is rife with conflict of interest and bias.

After Mr. Troy Crosby, assistant deputy minister, materiel, deemed that DND secretly making me a scapegoat to the CHRC was proper conduct, I formally complained to Minister Sajjan, because the deputy minister did not take timely action on my complaint against her subordinate, Mr. Crosby.

Mr. Choi, a peer of Mr. Crosby's, summarily and arbitrarily dismissed, without investigating, these allegations. Mr. Choi also summarily and arbitrarily dismissed my grievance against Mr. Crosby for Mr. Crosby's failure to follow procedural fairness. The director general who made the submission to the CHRC secretly making me the scapegoat reports directly to Mr. Choi.

Notwithstanding the above, the most sinister aspect of this departmental behaviour, which must not be overlooked, is that DND overtly sanctions a covert program of secretly making scapegoats to the Canadian Human Rights Commission to exonerate those responsible and culpable for harassment and human rights violations. This is appalling. It must end immediately. The CHRC and the human rights tribunal must be made aware of it.

There is a cultural problem in the defence department, but there is institutional reluctance to distinguish between the approximate and ultimate cause of this problem. From my perspective, the ultimate cause is a breakdown and failure in leadership to act in an ethical, morally appropriate, determined and deliberate manner to arrest and eliminate misconduct. Instead, they too often conduct it and condone it.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Drapeau, you have five minutes.

[Colonel, Retired) Michel Drapeau (Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Ottawa, As an Individual]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Canadian Armed Forces is in a crisis. Disappointingly, it is a long-standing crisis that extends back more than 20 years. In four cover stories published in 1998, Maclean's magazine alerted the Canadian public of a deep-seated crisis of rampant sexual misconduct in the Canadian military. Since that time, sadly, little has changed. In response to the 1998 sexual misconduct stories, Parliament, in its wisdom, transferred the powers of investigation and prosecution of sexual assault to the military. Parliament left it to the military to solve their problem internally. This was a huge mistake.

Given the recent revelations, which include the current and former chiefs of the defence staff as well as the commander of military personnel command being investigated for sexual misconduct, it goes without saying that instead of getting better, things got worse—much worse. There have been signs of this current crisis for decades, which should not have gone unnoticed.

In 2010, Colonel Russell Williams confessed to sexual assault of at least four women, the murder of two women—one civilian and one master corporal serving under his authority—and to having illegally invaded the homes and bedrooms of over 80 of his neighbours. In 2014, Maclean's and L'actualité magazines published the results of their investigation into sexual violence within our military, with Stéphanie Raymond, the victim of sexual misconduct by one of her male superiors, on its front cover. In 2015, retired Justice Marie Deschamps published a devastating exposé concerning the sexualized culture of the military. Her report made a number of recommendations, a number of which would be ignored and remain ignored by DND.

There is more. According to a survey by Statistics Canada in 2018, approximately 900 regular forces members were victims of sexual assault the previous year. Just let that sink in.

The following year, the 2019 Statistics Canada survey showed that 68% of Royal Military College students witnessed or experienced unwanted sexualized behaviours in 2018. Also, it reported that more than one in seven female students experienced sexual assaults in 2018, many of which were not reported.

In response to this long-standing crisis, the current senior management team at National Defence, led by the current minister, the current deputy minister and the since-departed CDS General Vance, joined ranks to put into place a program under the exaggerated title of Operation Honour as a means to bring discipline and fundamental respect and safety for women in the military. Truth be told, Operation Honour has proven to be based on conjecture and to be mostly an exercise in hyperbole. It is not working. Since the announcement of Operation Honour, our military's crisis has worsened.

Given my long-standing interest in this matter, over the past decades I have often appeared before parliamentary committees. I have co-authored several legal texts, and I have provided commentary on this subject in which I have proposed reforms to the military justice system.

Following my appearance before the Standing Committee on National Defence on February 22 of this year, in answer to the comments made by the Minister of National Defence before the same committee, and in the absence of any demonstrated proactivity from any of the leaders of our five political parties to deal with this crisis, I felt compelled to co-author a book titled Canada's Military Justice System Is in a Meltdown: Will Government Act? This book proposed some specific legislative reforms to address this crisis. It is produced in bilingual format and is available for free download at www.mdlo.ca.

At its core, this book recommends two things.

First, given the clear and compelling evidence that DND is unable to effectively deal with the enduring crisis of sexual misconduct and the deepening loss of public trust in the military high command, which has been decimated by allegations of sexual misconduct, and in the absence of substantive government leadership and action, Parliament should amend the National Defence Act to return jurisdiction for sexual assaults to civilian courts. This can be done simply and most quickly by amending section 70 of the National Defence Act.

Second, Parliament should appoint a civilian personality as inspector general of the armed forces—who will report to Parliament.

Ladies, I look forward to answering any questions that you may have. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Marilyn Gladu]

Thank you very much.

Now we'll begin our first round of questions with Ms. Alleslev for six minutes.

[Leona Alleslev, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Colonel Boland, if I might.... It's a complicated case. Thank you for laying it out for us, but I want to make sure that I have it right.

A woman who worked for you brought a complaint about the person you worked for to your attention, and you submitted that complaint on her behalf. In return, you were harassed, and she continued to be harassed. Then she escalated it to the Canadian Human Rights Commission. Do I have that right?

[LCol (Ret'd) Bernie Boland]

At its essence, yes, that's correct.

[Leona Alleslev, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Then, when she took it to the Human Rights Commission, DND had to respond, and its response was not to highlight the conduct of the person she was accusing, whom she was making allegations against, but rather to blame you for the harassment when that, categorically, was not the case.

[LCol (Ret'd) Bernie Boland]

Again, at its essence, that's absolutely correct.

[Leona Alleslev, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Without your knowledge, DND sent an official weighted response on its letterhead, as if it had the backing of the Canadian Armed Forces, to an outside organization, accusing you or stating that you had behaved inappropriately.

[LCol (Ret'd) Bernie Boland]

Yes, I provided that submission to the members. Hopefully they have a chance to look at it.

[Leona Alleslev, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Yes, we provided it, and the committee has it in both official languages if anybody wants to read it. So, obviously—