Thank you spending time on this critically important and urgent issue.
In the 1980s, from 13 to 17 years old, I was abused by teachers in a Vancouver public school.
Today, in fact, sexual abuse by school personnel is on the rise. When I was abused, that was 40 years ago, and I cannot believe that nothing has changed to better protect children and all individuals from abuse.
According to the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, at least 750 school children were subject to sexual abuse by school personnel between 2017 and 2021, and that is the tip of the iceberg.
Forty years ago, in the Quest program, we were emotionally, physically and sexually abused by three teachers across the hall from the principal, vice-principal and school counsellors. While the damage from the teachers' abuse is obvious, neuroscience shows on brain scans the physical damage to the brain, not only from the teachers' abuse but also from the failure of school personnel to stop it.
I am here today to address that lack of action and the systems that work against those who report and those who speak up.
I was an award-winning teacher for 20 years, but when I reported in 2012 to school personnel and governing bodies the direct reports from student athletes who were being subjected to a toxic culture of fear, favouritism and humiliation, the students were revictimized and I was exiled from the teaching profession.
As the mother of one of the victims, I watched first-hand the devastating impact on my son, not only from the abuse but from the “army of enablers”, to use Amos Guiora's phrase. While the abuse done to my son was sickening, he was clear that the enabling of the abuse and the cover-up by governing bodies were far worse.
I resigned in protest from that school that was covering up abuse, only to find myself in another school covering up abuse. This time, the abuse was sexual. Again, I heard it directly from a victim. I then watched first-hand as the school and governing bodies covered up the abuse and celebrated the perpetrator publicly in front of his victim. They did not tell the truth that he was fired after an extensive police investigation.
The commissioner for teacher regulation colluded by making his teaching certificate disappear from the registry of disciplined teachers. He had no restrictions on it when he sought out his victim at university and met with her again, further traumatizing her brain. She took her life several months later. She was 19.
Instead of being supported for trying to protect an abused student, I learned that being a whistle-blower put me at great risk, and there were no legal protections for me. The commissioner for teacher regulation did not try to protect the student victim or me. Instead, he put me under investigation for speaking up publicly about the teacher perpetrator and the risk he posed to other vulnerable students.
What is to be done?
A judicial inquiry like the Dubin inquiry in 1988 is 40 years overdue. We've had the knowledge of rampant child abuse and the damage it does since the 1980s, with further confirmation each following decade.
The urgent question is, when are we going to halt abuse? The equally urgent question is how. The answer lies in the Dubin Inquiry.
Dubin stated that:
The failure of many sport-governing bodies to treat the drug problem more seriously and to take more effective means to detect and deter the use of such drugs has also contributed in large measure to the extensive use of drugs by athletes.
This insight also applies to abuse.
The failure of sport governing bodies to treat the problem of abuse more seriously to effectively detect and deter abuse has contributed to the extent of it. If perpetrators think they can get away with it, they will do more of it.
Governing bodies in Canada are not motivated to protect victims of abuse. That negligence will instantly change when committed parliamentarians amend legislation so that it holds governing bodies criminally accountable for being accomplices to abuse and for committing the abuse of revictimization.
Provisions in the Criminal Code would act as a deterrent to governing bodies that are negligent, conduct sham investigations, cover up abuse, protect perpetrators and thereby refuse to treat seriously the harm done by all forms of abuse.
Most importantly, a fully independent parliamentary body is needed to address, investigate and keep a proper track record of all forms of abuse in sport, in education and beyond. It must be independent from sport, independent from education, independent from all governing bodies with conflicts of interest. It needs to be empowered to act independently and fearlessly. It needs to have the capacity to issue corrective measures.
I look forward to any questions you may have.