Veterans Affairs Committee on April 20th, 2023

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

We are now in session.

Welcome to the 46th meeting of the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs.

Today's meeting will take place in a hybrid format. We have with us witnesses who will be testifying in person and online.

Witnesses as well as committee members are asked to address their questions and comments to the chair.

Interpretation is available in French and English.

As per our routine motion, connection tests have been carried out with the witnesses.

We are conducting a study on the experience of women veterans.

Before we call our witnesses, I would like to provide this trigger warning. We will be discussing experiences related to mental health. This may be triggering to viewers, members or staff with similar experiences. If you feel distressed or need help, please advise the clerk.

I would now like to welcome our witnesses, who will have five minutes to make an opening statement. I will show some flexibility with the stopwatch.

Afterwards, committee members will take it in turns to ask questions.

Let me introduce our witnesses. Dr. Maya Eichler will be testifying via videoconference,

Canada research chair in social innovation and community engagement at Mount Saint Vincent University; from the National Association of Federal Retirees, Sayward Montague, director of advocacy; and from the Women Veterans Research and Engagement Network, Dr. Karen Breeck, co-chair.

We'll start with you, Dr. Eichler. You have five minutes for your opening remarks. Please open your microphone and begin.

[Dr. Maya Eichler, Canada Research Chair in Social Innovation and Community Engagement, Mount Saint Vincent University, As an Individual]

Thank you, Chair and members of the committee, for inviting me and for undertaking this historic study that puts women veterans front and centre.

I am joining you today from the ancestral and unceded territory of the Mi'kmaq, where I work at Mount Saint Vincent University. I speak to you as a researcher who focuses on the experiences of Canadian Armed Forces servicewomen and women veterans. I conduct qualitative social sciences research based primarily on interviews with veterans.

I want to state up front that I do not believe that you can or should look at the experiences of women veterans without consideration of the experiences of still-serving military women. This false bifurcation of women's lived experience is reflected in the institutional separation between the Department of National Defence on the one hand and Veterans Affairs Canada on the other. This institutional separation leads to less than ideal research, policy, programming and services, and so I want to urge you today to think of women's experiences across departmental lines of separation.

Over the past few years, research interest in women veterans has emerged in Canada. I will not repeat emerging research findings that other witnesses have already shared. Instead, I want to offer you a big-picture view of the state of research on women veterans in Canada and what I believe needs to change to better support women veterans and ensure equitable outcomes.

As our starting point, it is important to recognize that the military and veteran systems in place were historically designed for men, specifically Second World War veteran men. Even as more women were allowed to join the military over the decades, and especially after the lifting of the combat ban in 1989, DND, CAF and VAC did not proactively change the systems in place. However, women have bodies, experiences and needs that are distinct from men's. There is little to no support or research in place in Canada today to address women's sex- and gender-specific needs, but also, women have had to work within a system that potentially causes additional harm, injury and illness because it was built without them in mind.

While these historic biases are somewhat explicable, it is deplorable that there has never in Canada been the political will or considered effort to undo these historic biases in military and veteran systems and research. It is no exaggeration to say that research on military servicewomen and women veterans has been historically unsupported and undervalued in Canada. To a large extent, it still is today.

The much larger and more robust international research, primarily from the United States, points to sex- and gender-specific military occupational hazards and lifelong impacts on military and veteran women that remain largely unexplored in the Canadian context.

It is paramount that these gaps in knowledge be filled. This is necessary to ensure sex- and gender-informed harm prevention as well as sex- and gender-informed care for service-related injuries and illness during and after service and across the life span of military and veteran women.

Research on military and veteran women, as I've already noted, is currently experiencing an upswing in Canada; however, this new growth is unevenly developed and lacks strategic coordination and collaboration. What we see to date is that individual researchers inside and outside of government have taken the initiative to begin addressing research gaps, but I would argue that individual researchers can advance this research area only so far.

Various types of research on servicewomen and women veterans are needed that go beyond individual expertise. Clinical medical research, integrated health and social sciences research, longitudinal research, mixed-method research and more are needed.

There is an urgent need for a pan-Canadian research strategy; that is, an approach that is strategic, coordinated, collaborative, interdisciplinary, cross-departmental and cross-sectoral so that gaps in knowledge about the needs and experiences of servicewomen and women veterans of the Canadian Armed Forces can be effectively addressed.

Research matters, because it can tell us whether or not outcomes are equitable. From the emerging research that we have, we know that women are not experiencing equitable outcomes in the military workplace, in military and veteran care systems and in the transition from military to civilian life—

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Excuse me, Dr. Eichler. Are you close to concluding, or do you need—

[Dr. Maya Eichler]

Yes, I have three sentences left.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Okay. Please go ahead.

[Dr. Maya Eichler]

It is the responsibility of the government to ensure equitable outcomes for women by removing biases and barriers. This requires a proactive, preventative, research-driven strategy that draws on existing best practices of sex- and gender-based intersectional analysis and trauma-aware and participatory approaches.

Turning a blind eye is no longer feasible. Research gaps should be acknowledged, and dedicated government research funding should be set aside to address them in a strategic manner.

Thank you so much, Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you so much, Dr. Eichler.

I'd like to welcome two of our colleagues. We have Mrs. Michelle Ferreri, who will replace Terry Dowdall. We also have Brendan Hanley for Rechie Valdez. Welcome to our committee.

I also want to thank our vice-president, Mr. Richards, who chaired the committee last meeting.

Now let's have Madame Montague on board, please. You have about five minutes for your opening remarks. Please go ahead.

[Sayward Montague, Director, Advocacy, National Association of Federal Retirees]

Thank you, Chair.

I'm delighted to be joining the committee here in Ottawa on the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people, who have lived on this land since time immemorial.

Federal Retirees is the largest national advocacy organization representing not only the federal public sector, but veterans of the Canadian Armed Forces and the RCMP, as well as their partners and survivors. Our nearly 170,000 members from coast to coast to coast and in every federal riding advocate for better retirement income security and a strong, sustainable health care system for our members and all Canadians and, relevant to this committee, for more equitable outcomes for veterans.

Federal Retirees is also proud to co-chair the Women Veterans Research and Engagement Network, or WREN. WREN's mission is to work collaboratively to ensure equitable lifetime outcomes for all veterans.

In 2017, Federal Retirees held a series of town halls and digital surveys across the country, reaching out to our veteran members and their families, and to the broader community. We were keen to learn what veterans struggled with and what worked well. We heard from hundreds and followed up with a series of meetings that brought varied stakeholders together, and we tabled two substantive reports.

In those 600 pages of reports, though, there was not one mention of women veterans' specific needs, interests or concerns. We had unintentionally silenced women veterans by not ensuring they had a voice and a role in co-developing the consultation and report. We've since learned that one in five of our members who are veterans are women. To do right by all our members, our advocacy program shifted to active as opposed to passive inclusion of women veterans' voices to advocate for equitable outcomes for all veterans. We've done that by bringing Federal Retirees' recommendations on women veterans' issues forward to both our association members and parliamentarians during the last four federal elections. We have also done that by securing political meetings and discussions required to ensure that equity issues such as improved intersectional data collection and publication become standard across defence-related government departments. We ensure that women veterans' voices are heard directly, including within Federal Retirees' Sage magazine, and by association-sponsored events on veteran identities, which included Christine Wood and Michelle Douglas, two recent witnesses to this committee.

The 2022 budget signalled a commitment to more equitable outcomes, with more than $144 million over five years and $31.6 million ongoing to expand the armed forces health services and physical fitness programs to be more responsive to women and gender-diverse military personnel. This has a direct impact on outcome for those serving, and eventually on veterans. It was in addition to and separate from funding promised in the 2021 budget to the tune of $158 million over five years for sexual misconduct and gender-based violence supports in the military.

Budget 2023, by contrast, has little to say about veterans or health equity in the military context, besides $115 million in funding to help Veterans Affairs Canada to deal with the perpetual backlog and to retain case managers. Veterans are hearing that VAC had unexpected cuts to some of its budget requests, including requests to make temporary jobs permanent.

It isn't always clear what the problems are or what the plan is to solve those problems. Gender blindness in military and veteran systems, including in health care, result in systemic, sex-based biases, research gaps and increased rates of injury and illness resulting in unnecessarily high rates of medical releases for women—potentially around 50% of women's releases from the military. There is an opportunity to make a difference in research. It's the best way to inform good policy that makes a difference.

It's well past time for Canada to focus on equitable outcomes for those who serve, and not only on things like wait times. This means a dedicated plan, funding, goals, transparency in reporting and accountability to achieve the desired objectives across relevant departments. What we ask Veterans Affairs to adjudicate is directly linked with what happened during service or how the armed forces and the RCMP take care of occupational health and well-being.

The committee must be congratulated on the focus and breadth of this study, but success of the study will be defined by what you and your colleagues decide to do with the evidence being brought to you. With focus and will, it's possible to ensure that future generations of Canadian military women and veterans have very different stories to tell.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you so much, Ms. Montague.

Now I'd like to give the floor to Dr. Karen Breeck for five minutes or less. Please go ahead.

[Dr. Karen Breeck, Major (Retired), Co-chair, The Women Veterans Research and Engagement Network]

As a physician who served in uniform for over 20 years, I will begin by thanking, through the chair, all the members of the standing committee for agreeing to this first-ever study on women veterans. Thank you.

I have followed the health of hundreds of military and veteran women over the last three decades and look forward to discussing specific recommendations during the question period. I want to first share with the committee three things that I find helpful to frame my thinking around women veteran issues.

Number one is the problem definition. What is the problem we are trying to solve? It’s important that we start by situating the need for this study on women veterans. I'd like to remind the committee and all Canadians listening in today that not all women veterans are seriously injured, suffering from military sexual trauma or having transition problems after leaving the military; however, I hope we all can agree that we want all veterans to be doing well, not just some.

One problem this study could look at is how to best ensure that government is optimizing the well-being of all women veterans. The question then becomes how we will know when we've solved that problem. How do we best measure quality of life or well-being? Furthermore, what exactly is the present-day social contract between Canadians and the post-Second World War generation veteran? Without a very clear understanding of what it is that's too much for veterans to be asking for, how can a new military recruit make an informed decision about what they are signing up for?

Problem number two is terminology. Are all the terms we're using being defined? Words matter. Biological sex, gender identity and sexual orientation are all related and overlapping, but they are not interchangeable terms. Words must be defined contextually and used precisely. When this is not done, especially around women’s well-being issues, it tends to stall the forward progress on all the problems trying to be solved.

Number three is the ability to fix. Who is best placed to address this specific problem? There's no shortage of important, often heartbreaking problems that are experienced by women veterans. However, it must first be remembered that, just because you're a woman veteran with a problem, that doesn’t automatically mean that your problem is because you're a woman veteran.

When we look at women veterans' specific problems, they need focused political will with dedicated funding to allow the legacy systems that were designed by men, for men to equitably accommodate women. In retrospect, it was government’s decision to enforce a gender-blind approach to integration for women into the military that has forced the invisibility of most of the military women-specific issues.

Military women, especially of the 1980s and 1990s, have worked long and hard, often at great personal expense, to not only live with the inequities of a gender-blind approach but to name them and fix them for the sake of the next generation of women coming up behind them.

Although many of the inequities have now been addressed from the bottom up, there remain problems that can be fixed only at the government level or top down. This is the level I encourage the committee to focus its efforts on, because only you can fix those problems.

Canada was a world leader in the integration of women into the military 30 years ago. The Canadian government has an opportunity right now to regain its leadership status by strategically planning on how best to mainstream, normalize, enable and optimize the well-being of women who wish to serve their country in uniform.

I close my remarks with a call to action. I ask, if not plead, both as a physician and as a veteran myself, for every member here today to commit to working together without politics on finding the best solutions for the health and well-being of military members, serving and retired.

I, and many others, are willing to work together with all parliamentarians to secure a stronger, more resilient military.

Women make up half the Canadian population. It's rapidly becoming an issue of national security importance to develop a strategic, whole-of-government plan on how to do better on including and caring for the women of this nation when they join the military and thereafter.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you so much, Dr. Breeck. Thank you also for your service in the military.

Right now, we're going to start the round of questions.

I just want to let committee members know that around 7:30 p.m., we will take a small break at the request of the witnesses, so that everyone can have a little breathing space.

Let's start the first round of questions, for six minutes.

I'd like to invite Mrs. Cathay Wagantall for six minutes please.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Thank you very much, Chair.

I appreciate what we've heard already this evening and look forward to our conversations. Thank you so much for your service and for being here tonight to inform us better.

Ms. Montague, reading about the report you did in 2017, 600 pages is a lot of report. It's interesting to me that you came to the realization that the term “gender-blind” applied here. I really appreciate that you recognized that.

I just wonder if are you aware of how many women veterans actually participated under the whole group. Can you give just a rough idea? You say “hundreds” were engaged.

[Sayward Montague]

We had roughly 600 veterans participate. Because of our own blindness at the time in terms of the issues, we did not track back the demographics of participants.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

When you talk about the surveys and whatnot, was nothing targeted specifically to women in the study?

[Sayward Montague]

That's correct. There was nothing targeted specifically to women.

In addition, I think the impact of in-person meetings and the quality of that must be understood when you perhaps have an event or an open town hall-style meeting in an environment where there isn't specific space for women who have been harmed or have had terrible experiences. Having that space be appropriate was not something we cared for. We've learned since.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Exactly. Were there no women on the research team that did this work?

[Sayward Montague]

We are a membership-based, non-profit association. We are not research or academic. Staff developed this, and that was the outcome.

Unfortunately, it was a lens that we viewed things through, which we've since corrected.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Okay, that's great.

Now, as you've moved forward, you've changed your approach. How many women are engaged in making those changes to that approach?

[Sayward Montague]

In terms of our staff team, we have a leadership team that includes three women, including me, out of five senior positions. Our board is well represented by women, including not women who are serving, but service members. We also work closely with the women veterans research and engagement network to engage and understand, and to ensure that lens is included.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Thank you.

The second point you mentioned was about helping to secure “political meetings and discussions...to ensure that equity issues such as improved intersectional data collection and publication....” Can you just tell me just a quick yes or no? In your mind, has this happened?

[Sayward Montague]

In our view, it has happened. We're an advocacy organization. We have lobbying meetings frequently with some of the members around this table, and we consistently raise these issues.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Has it improved the intersectional data collection and publication, yes or no?

[Sayward Montague]

That would be a question best answered by Dr. Eichler, who can speak to the state of research and how that's changed over time.

[Cathay Wagantall, Conservative, Yorkton—Melville, SK]

Perfect, okay.

I want to go to your second comment, around the budget. You indicated that money was allocated in 2022, but it was to be spread out over five years. I'm confused. Was that money then provided in 2023 as well, yes or no?

[Sayward Montague]

My understanding is that was provided over the 2022-23 fiscal year.