Thank you, Madam Chair and members of this committee, for inviting me to speak today and for your work in investigating these critical issues.
My name is Andrea Neil. I'm a former player, captain and coach for the Vancouver Whitecaps and the Canadian women's national soccer team. I spent 18 years as a midfielder, participating in four FIFA Women's World Cups as a player, a fifth as a coach in 2011, and a sixth as media in 2015. When I retired, I had the most international appearances of any soccer player in Canadian history. I have my UEFA “A” coaching licence from Italy. I was the first woman and third soccer player to be inducted into Canada's Sports Hall of Fame.
I have played sports my whole life. I know that it can be an incredible platform for honourable accomplishment, human development and positive social change. Unfortunately, a pervasive, toxic and unhealthy leadership paradigm in our culture today harms many people who participate and work in sports. It is a paradigm that uses as its compass points the accumulation of power, prestige and money, not the development, support and safety of those they are meant to nurture and build.
I know that my speaking time is limited today. I will use it to share some examples from my soccer career that illuminate key areas to address if sports in this country are to be the flourishing developmental ground that we need to them to be.
I am involved now as my child learns to play, and I have long coached various age and playing levels. My deep connection with the women's national team program runs from its founding members to players still on the team today. For years, and as recently as a week ago, I have observed and listened to countless stories of mistreatment, abuse and corruption. A single instance should be unacceptable. The unrelenting pattern of repetition is alarming, and it must be learned from.
For 15 years I stood alongside a small group of women as they risked their financial, physical, mental and emotional health to bring former national team coach Bob Birarda to justice for his sexual and psychological abuse of players. When I saw that Canada Soccer had quietly dismissed Birarda as a coach, conveniently shrouding the firing as mutually agreed, and therefore enabling him to begin coaching girls again months later, these women took their experience to the police to prevent future harm.
Canada Soccer could not be counted upon. Our national federation had completely failed at safeguarding. They had irresponsibly shifted his predatory behaviour on.
These women have been dismissed, diminished and devalued as human beings by those who are responsible for keeping them safe. Even now, with Birarda's abusive behaviour across 20 years of coaching established in a court of law, culminating in his guilty verdict and jail sentence, these victims are still waiting for a statement from Canada Soccer and are still waiting for Canada Soccer to ban him from coaching.
The federation's response has been to insist that their first failed investigation was thorough and extensive to avert from rather than take responsibility. Only pressure by the Olympic champion women's team forced a further inquiry, which resulted in the revealing, however incomplete, McLaren report.
Players have had to join hands across generations to force the current management in our national federation to begin to do the right thing and to properly look into things. I wish I could say I was surprised by the obfuscations and lack of accountability, but I had seen this sort of dodge before, when my vantage point as an assistant coach in the national program made me aware of deeply concerning financial improprieties and organizational irregularities, which I helped raise to no avail.
Real leaders pay attention. They look and they listen. But when athletes or staff have flagged concerns about Canada Soccer, this has not happened. In fact, they've been dismissed. Those brave enough to call on them to do better have not been protected. Some have suffered retributions; others have been silenced and smothered by non-disclosure agreements and clauses in employment contracts.
We have seen, with Hockey Canada, that a lack of safety and a lack of transparency around funding are not two distinct problems. They reflect leadership that has lost its moorings. These issues combine and intersect to impede the development of people who deserve to be striving and thriving through their sport.
My purpose is to use these examples to highlight the need for a new leadership paradigm, one based on trust, service, community, equality, consideration and care. What kind of culture has Canada Soccer created in the past? What kind of culture will it set out to intentionally build now? Unfortunately, it has proven time and again that it cannot regulate itself.
I call on our government to take meaningful action in support of transforming sports across Canada. Here are three crucial calls to action.
One, we need a judicial inquiry into the culturally ingrained abuse within our national sporting organizations. I appreciate your convening this forum for feedback. Nothing can change until we turn the lights on and reckon with where we are.
Two, we need to rebuild our sports organizations with this self-scrutiny in mind. We need to clearly establish and communicate the portals for feedback and commit to looking into what they bring up. We need to make policies against retaliation for reporting. In a culture so awry, whistle-blowers are essential in raising awareness and getting us back on course.
Three, we need to commit to a comprehensive forensic audit into Canada Soccer's finances and to publicly disclose how funding is being used and why to ensure the mission of the organization is being carried out ethically and effectively.
Until we see things clearly and courageously create a new leadership culture in these organizations, the vulnerable members of our society will continue to be put at risk, and the harm that I have all too often witnessed in my career will continue to happen.
With awareness, effort and a heart-centred compass point, we can head in the correct direction, but not without also investigating within ourselves what blocks our ability to see, support, protect and care for other human beings when they're in need.
Thank you very much.