Status of Women committee  It was a result of a complaint coming to his attention. It might have come through a letter or some other form, but his office was open to receive those complaints directly.

Status of Women committee  Yes, Madam Chair, I think that one of the principal issues as well is that military members and commanders have a positive duty to deal with any issues that come before them. They cannot let issues slide. Their failure to comply with that directive could be treated under the code of service discipline, and they could be subject to disciplinary measures for such failure.

Status of Women committee  Well, it can't be anonymous because the respondent has a right to know the nature of the complaint and who is making the complaint. There is a balance of responsibilities that has to be observed here.

Status of Women committee  Well, Madam Chair, I think that those kind of exemplary disciplinary proceedings are important in that they signal a shift in the culture. Whereas previously that kind of behaviour might have been accepted, it indicated that it was clearly no longer acceptable. In fact, that's part of the basic lesson that is drilled into new members of the armed forces, that they have a responsibility to correct or report, as appropriate, any observed harassment, and that they have a duty to take action if they have the authority to do so, as well as encourage others to take action if they feel that they require that form of support.

Status of Women committee  The only thing I would add is that if you think the statistics are artificially low, for example—

Status of Women committee  That's the department. I speak for the Canadian Forces.

Status of Women committee  Absolutely. We do comparisons. I cited Statistics Canada data earlier in terms of the employment of women. We do comparisons with the national databases. We do comparisons with other government departments. We do comparisons with other militaries. We're part of an organization called the Technical Cooperation Program, which includes Canada, the United States, the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand.

Status of Women committee  We steal from each other.

Status of Women committee  In the survey 90% of the respondents recalled having been through some form of harassment training. To set the stage for that answer and explain why that might have been the case, during the late nineties—I can't remember when we discontinued the SHARP program—we had a blitz across the Canadian Forces that required everybody who was serving at the time to take part in this one-day or one-and-a-half-day training program on standards for harassment and racism prevention.

Status of Women committee  We could do that.

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, if I understand the question correctly, I wouldn't say that we don't have any cases of sexual harassment or sexual assault. Every large organization like ours is going to have to deal with that. I would hope that we would get to zero one day, but I don't think that's realistic.

Status of Women committee  Right. They are anonymous surveys. We have two kinds of survey procedures. We have an internal research capability made up of a broad range of Department of National Defence scientists. They conduct specialized, focused surveys, which can be administered on an as-required basis or periodically.

Status of Women committee  We don't use the public service employment survey because our members are not public servants, so there's a different set of—

Status of Women committee  That's the million-dollar question, I think.

Status of Women committee  I don't think you can do that a priori. We establish appropriate social norms of interaction as we go along. It is through the process of social interaction that we determine what's appropriate and what's inappropriate. The important thing, if you think it's inappropriate, is to say it is inappropriate.