Status of Women Committee on Feb. 13th, 2023

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you.

We heard the heartbreaking stories. Some athletes have said that they are at the breaking point. What mental health support is being provided to athletes who are survivors of violence or abuse? How are these services being strengthened and improved?

[Isabelle Mondou]

OSIC is going to have some mental health support and some trauma support for athletes, but obviously not everybody wants to go to seek them, and not everybody should. Some people just want the support they need at the moment they need it, and that's why the minister announced, just before Christmas, $2.4 million in mental health support. That's going to be provided to any athlete who feels they need it—not to improve in their competition or their sport, but just to improve their well-being. It's not for a person's better performance; it's focused on the wellness of athletes.

[Sonia Sidhu, Liberal, Brampton South, ON]

Thank you.

We need better training across all levels. Can you expand on how the government is promoting education and training for coaches, officials and the sporting community on abuse and harassment in sports, especially for women and girls?

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

You have 20 seconds to respond.

[Isabelle Mondou]

I will say just a couple of things. Obviously the Coaching Association has a huge role to play, and we are working on them to make sure that every coach is properly trained, but the point about education goes well beyond coaches. That's why the minister also announced support for AthletesCAN on Friday. It is an organization of athletes that will be a wonderful place that can provide some of that education.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Excellent. Thank you so much.

We're now going for rounds of two and a half minutes, and Sébastien, you have the floor.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Why is it that, in Canadian sport, male athletes get more than female athletes, both financially and in terms of access to services?

The services available to male teams are clearly often light years ahead of those available to female teams in a number of sports. Just look at the structures related to hockey, especially in the university environment: women's hockey is grossly underfunded compared with men's hockey. In the soccer world, questions have also been raised in recent months about the cuts to the funding for the women's soccer team.

Where is the equality?

[Isabelle Mondou]

I think that is an excellent question.

Sport Canada financially supports women's teams. That said, if the money has not been going to women's teams, the minister is going to have to look into the situation, as that would be unacceptable. Generally, women's sports should be funded the same as men's sports.

Of course, Hockey Canada receives a lot of money from the private sector. As we can see, the money is spent more on meeting the needs of men's teams. That's where the governance of Hockey Canada is important, to make sure we bring equality back to the system.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Would you or the minister be able to do an audit on the Soccer Canada issue? I would invite you to think about it, based on the information we have received.

How could we better support female athletes, now that we know that private funding structures, among others, benefit men?

[Isabelle Mondou]

There are different ways of doing that, but I'll give you an example related to accessibility.

We knew that our Olympic athletes received bursaries, but not our Paralympic athletes, because of unequal funding from the private sector. We are currently looking at how we can use public funding to address that gap, until private funding catches up. That's one way of evening things out.

[Sébastien Lemire, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

I urge you to keep those efforts up.

Do national sport organizations still have to report abuse and maltreatment to Sport Canada, or does that information go only to OSIC now?

[Isabelle Mondou]

That's a very good question.

We still receive complaints, but as organizations sign on to the abuse-free sport program, the complaints will go to OSIC.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

Thank you so much.

We'll go over to Bonita for two and a half minutes.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

This is around the Canadian Heritage sport support program.

Each national sport organization funded by Canadian Heritage's sport support program must have a policy on harassment, abuse and discrimination. My question is really around the sanctions. It was a word that was used earlier. What sanctions are in place for national sports organizations that fail to comply with that policy? Have any sanctions been exercised that you could share with us?

[Isabelle Mondou]

It's a very good question.

In 2019, former minister Duncan required all organizations to have a policy in exchange for funding. Based on that, Sport Canada developed what we call a report card, which didn't exist before. It was a pilot. On that basis, we started to monitor what organizations were doing. They had to report to us, and we assessed the reports.

We found through the pilot that although the tool was very good, what was not sufficient was that we were only receiving information from the organizations themselves. We wanted to receive information from different sources to make sure that what we were assessing was informed not only by the organization itself but by others.

That's part of the work that the minister is going to announce shortly for the new round of funding.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

I have a follow-up question on that point. Are parents going to be involved as a regular input point?

[Isabelle Mondou]

Some things that are being considered are athletes' voices, but other voices could be heard through, for example, an audit—not a financial audit, but one that includes people who look at the application of those policies. The auditor could consult evaluative people, including whoever they feel would be a good voice to check.

Those are some of the things being looked at.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

With so many testimonies and so many stories—and I think we're just on the tip of the iceberg of things that have happened over the decades—have there been sanctions? Have sanctions ever been exercised for coaches, staff or organizations?

[Isabelle Mondou]

Over the years, some people have found themselves in front of the court and some have been found guilty. For others, there have complaints and they have not been found guilty, but they have been sanctioned within the organization. I will say these haven't been done in a way that is sufficient. That's why we see the crisis we have now.

[The Chair, Conservative, Karen Vecchio]

I'm sorry, Bonita. Thank you so much.

We're going to finish up our round. We'll go to Warren Steinley for five minutes and then over to Marc Serré for five.

Go ahead.

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

I wanted to dig down a little bit on this. You're in charge of the national bodies, and that really has nothing to do with the provincial organizations, which I find a bit interesting.

I have a bit of hockey background. Whenever you go to Hockey Saskatchewan about why these rules or principles have come down, the answer is that they come down from Hockey Canada.

I'm assuming many other provincial bodies and sports organizations are like that, in that they take their lead from the national body for guiding principles for what would happen if there is an indiscretion.

I think you do have a bit more responsibility for some of those provincial bodies than you're letting on. I would like to get some comments on the fact that most of the time these provincial entities are taking their lead from the federal bodies that govern sports.

[Isabelle Mondou]

I wouldn't say they have nothing to do with them; I will say they have other players involved. Your example is a good example.

Some national federations are actually very close to the provincial bodies. In some other cases, they don't speak to each other.

There are other groups of sports that are not even affiliated with any provincial and national sport organization. They are affiliated with U.S. groupings. The sport system is unfortunately very complex, and—

[Warren Steinley, Conservative, Regina—Lewvan, SK]

That's what I figured.

My question was leading into that. How tightly affiliated is the national gymnastics body with provincial and local clubs? How much of a lead do they take from that? Would the situation be similar to hockey or to some of the organizations in that, as you say, there isn't much of a connection between the national, provincial and local clubs?

[Isabelle Mondou]

With your permission, I will turn to my colleague.

[Jaimie Earley]

Certainly.

As my colleague said, each national sport organization does have a different structure. One of the things, I think, that—