Status of Women committee  Thank you, Minister. Madam Chair, sexual misconduct training is conducted annually for all members of the Canadian Armed Forces, but in my view annually is not enough, and there has to be a constant drumbeat to remind our members of what right looks like. In terms of gaps in th

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, from my perspective, the Canadian Forces national investigation service has the mandate to investigate all allegations of a criminal nature. Thank you.

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, it's regardless of rank.

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, I don't have prepared remarks per se, but I will give you a few comments. First of all, thank you for the opportunity to address this committee. I will say up front that the current circumstances have shaken us, and I believe the armed forces are at an inflection

Status of Women committee  We have to learn why previous approaches did not work, learn from that and incorporate those lessons into our plan going forward. As we go forward, I see us moving forward on two streams. The first stream is that any external review that looks at our organization we have to embr

Status of Women committee  Understand that I have only been in the job for several weeks. One of the things I immediately asked for was an aide-mémoire—a playbook, if you will—to help me deal with any further incidents of senior leader misconduct, so that we could rapidly deal with those. That was one.

Status of Women committee  It's still a draft at this point. Once it is finalized, we will be happy to share that. As for the second one, last week I had all our general and flag officers on a Teams session. If there's one thing the pandemic has taught us, it is how to use technology, so it was all of our

Status of Women committee  Every allegation deserves a full investigation, and we have to respect our values of due process and the rule of law. Every allegation that comes forward will be investigated and will follow due process.

Status of Women committee  If it is in the chain of command, one reporting to the other, it creates what we call an “adverse relationship”. If it is not in the same chain of command, it is not an offence, but we have to make very sure that there is not a perceived conflict of interest. One thing we need t

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, yes. Along with that power comes responsibility as well. One of the things we have to get much better at understanding is human power dynamics, especially in a fairly rigid military hierarchy. Understanding what constitutes the use of that power is something that we

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, over the course of the last several weeks, a number of survivors have reached out to me. I've established contact to listen to their stories. One thing that is apparent to me is that we need to bring in some mechanism whereby survivors can achieve closure, perhaps w

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, I cannot speak definitively on what consultation occurred before I got into this chair. Definitely, going forward, they need to be part of the conversation and part of the solution.

Status of Women committee  In terms of interference in any investigation, the investigators have the recourse to put in a complaint with the Military Police Complaints Commission if they feel their investigation is being unduly influenced. I understand that you have the commanding officer of the Canadian F

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, we absolutely have to create an armed forces where all feel not only physically safe, but psychologically safe as well, where all members feel that they truly belong, where they can speak up when they see something that doesn't look right, and where they can feel fre

Status of Women committee  Madam Chair, it is absolutely essential that we address this. In fact, I view it as existential for the Canadian Armed Forces. It's a paradox that as our nation's population grows, our traditional recruiting pool is shrinking. If we cannot attract the talent that is resident in