National Defence committee  The commander of the army has as a champion a master warrant officer, Master Warrant Officer Greyeyes— the last person who I remember was there.

National Defence committee  He's the adviser to the commander of the army, and also the indigenous champion. So there are people throughout, if the chain of command wants to establish a position for it. But it's like anything else: it takes resources. You take from Peter; you have to pay Paul.

National Defence committee  Currently there is an aboriginal member who's assigned to the chaplain here in Ottawa, who's the aboriginal adviser on spiritual affairs. But that's only here in Ottawa, so it's at the highest level. How long will this position be there? We don't know.

National Defence committee  No, he's there for the chaplains.

National Defence committee  But he's a sergeant—

National Defence committee  I totally agree with that. A local elder is the elder for the RMC ALOY. He's from that area. He is paid by RMC to be their elder. Excellent work is being done with him. That's a good model to follow.

National Defence committee  Yes, I see that as a positive move.

National Defence committee  Being a reserve officer, I'll say you're totally correct. The units are in populous areas. When I joined the reserves, the unit did its own recruiting. They have limits. In my battalion in London, we had to turn people away from joining because we only had so much money every year to hire—to enrol people and pay them.

National Defence committee  The senior officers do not see what's happening at the lower level. It's up to the CO to talk to his junior officers to find out what's happening at the lower level. The junior officer has to talk to his warrant officers, his sergeants and his men. If the leadership is not doing this all the way down, then it's broken.

National Defence committee  Regarding my statement that I do not know of any barriers, the last time I was in a recruiting office was in 1983. If there are barriers, someone would have to tell me that. No one has ever told me that there are barriers.

National Defence committee  Ms. Pope should go first.

National Defence committee  This is probably a good time to bring this up. My last posting was with the director of casualty support management, and I was also the acting CO of the JPSU on a number of occasions. One of the dilemmas as the CO of the JPSU is care of the ill and injured indigenous member. I was not allowed to tackle this when I was acting CO—the boss wouldn't let me do it—but the problem as a commanding officer is that you are limited in what you can do to help the indigenous member in his treatment program.

National Defence committee  I do not know how the Americans recruit indigenous people. I believe we are moving forward in a proper way. We are going out to them and engaging the indigenous youth. The other day I was talking to an old friend of mine from the sixties era. He told me how the Royal Canadian Regiment used to go up north in Ontario to recruit.

National Defence committee  I think I can answer that. I believe it all comes down to one simple thing: money—the cost of sending these teams to remote areas, the time it takes. The funding is not there anymore. Throughout my career as a senior officer, my God, I've had to sharpen my pencil so many times to keep my budget under control for what I needed to do, not what I wanted to do.

National Defence committee  Well, as a young lad, I was in Cubs, in Scouts. One of my heroes was my great-uncle, who passed in the First World War. He had won the Military Cross and bar. That was the start of my family history in the military. My uncle was a tail gunner during World War II. I always admired him.