On the first about whether it blocked women, yes, it did. It did. People talk, so if somebody has a bad experience, other women, other members, are going to hear about that and hear about it fairly quickly.
It's our information that one-third of claimants were not accepted under Merlo Davidson, and even those whose claims were accepted did not get assessed at the level they expected. Presumably they went in expecting to have their claims accepted at a higher level. They didn't get that.
Then there were other women that we know of who were affected and who could not even face putting a claim in, so yes, in our council's view, whatever numbers the RCMP or VAC have for claimants in the class action, they likely fall far short of those who were actually affected or suffered some kind of abuse during their service.
We also have anecdotal evidence of people who did go through the lengthy process of putting in a claim. They were shattered all over again, and in some cases suffered new PTSD that they hadn't even had before. As you said, there was retraumatizing all around.
The class action should not even have been necessary. The RCMP had known about these problems for years, but they did nothing. Certainly, for the women who were brave enough to come forward, I'm sure it was their expectation, as it was our expectation, that it would change things, that there would be behaviour correction. Money was not going to make them whole again.
Just briefly—