Status of Women committee  It's the same for me.

Status of Women committee  Obviously I can't speak to a number of the initiatives that you've mentioned because they're so new. We don't have any data yet about whether they're working or not. You mentioned better education for managers. Some of the education needs to happen to allow managers to better recognize sexual harassment when it's happening in front of them.

Status of Women committee  —at least, so let's say that six months after the complaint is filed, there's an investigation report. The deputy head gets the investigation report. The delegation goes to the ADM of HR. The ADM of HR decides we're going to take some appropriate action. It's nine months later. The victim of sexual harassment has just been through nine months of investigation while they've been on sick leave, or moved out of their unit.

Status of Women committee  I agree. They're not looking for vindication but for recognition that there has been something wrong, that they have been a victim of sexual harassment, and that somebody in power recognizes that.

Status of Women committee  That would be fine.

Status of Women committee  No.

Status of Women committee  No, I haven't looked carefully enough at how this is dealt with in other countries.

Status of Women committee  I agree with you that a cultural improvement in the public service would be helpful, but echoing comments made by Mr. Gaon earlier, the federal public service is generally seen to be good at this. There is broad acceptance that sexual harassment is inappropriate in the workplace, particularly in the federal public service, so I don't think we need that big a culture change.

Status of Women committee  Yes, I believe a set of options would certainly be helpful. Whether that's done by legislative change or requires legislative change depends on the type of options you are looking at. A lot of them would be simply changes in policies or practices within the workplace.

Status of Women committee  I have one recommendation, at least. It is to make sure that there is a forum where complaints will be accepted and addressed and where the victims of sexual harassment will receive the necessary or appropropiate redress. There are a number of different ways that could happen. One way it could happen would be to clarify the jurisdiction of adjudicators under the Public Service Labour Relations Act.

Status of Women committee  I can do that.

Status of Women committee  The legal mechanism is very sparse for that sort of thing. In the core public administration—this is the Treasury Board employees—they are governed by the Public Service Employment Act, which does permit the deployment of a manager who has been found to have harassed his or her subordinates.

Status of Women committee  That's right. There are a number of things that can be done, but each of them would have to be contextual. There is no one solution that's going to fit every single circumstance. Some of the things that can be done are to change the reporting relationship between the victim and the alleged perpetrator of sexual harassment.

Status of Women committee  No.

Status of Women committee  That's all true. I want to say that there are benefits to resolution outside of the informal resolution. Informal resolution has both the benefit and the detriment of being confidential. There's no publicity around promoting people coming forward with sexual harassment complaints if it's done informally.