THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, DEFENCE AND VETERANS AFFAIRS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Tuesday, June 9, 2026
The Standing Senate Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs met with videoconference this day at 11 a.m. [ET] to study Bill C-11, An Act to amend the National Defence Act and other Acts.
Senator Marty Deacon (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Good morning. Welcome to this meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on National Security, Defence and Veterans Affairs. I am Marty Deacon, a senator from Ontario and chair of this committee. I would like to begin today by offering my colleagues the opportunity to introduce themselves.
Senator Al Zaibak: Senator Mohammad Al Zaibak, a senator for Ontario.
[Translation]
Senator Youance: Suze Youance from Quebec.
[English]
Senator Patterson: Rebecca Patterson, Ontario. Don’t touch the button.
Senator Dasko: Donna Dasko, Ontario.
Senator Anderson: Margaret Dawn Anderson, Northwest Territories.
Senator Yussuff: Senator Yussuff, Ontario.
Senator McNair: John McNair, New Brunswick. Welcome today.
Senator Busson: Welcome. I am Bev Busson from British Columbia.
Senator Hay: Katherine Hay from Ontario.
The Chair: Thank you. Before we begin, colleagues, I would like to take an opportunity. I would be remiss if I did not before we start, to acknowledge two of our members who will be having their last meetings coming up this week, and that’s Senator Al Zaibak and Senator Donna Dasko. A thank you very much to Senator Boehm, who has been covering in for Senator Kutcher for the last little while.
I will not be here for tomorrow’s session, so I just wanted to indulge a quick moment on acknowledging these folks that are here who have been working around the table.
To my deputy, who has filled in for me a few times, and will again tomorrow, I want to thank you for welcoming me on to the steering committee and facilitating a smooth transition with your timely and helpful advice.
I have also had the pleasure of serving with you on the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade, and I really appreciate your contributions. It sounds like your speech in the Senate, but it is not meant to be. It is meant to thank and acknowledge you here in this group today. Thank you for that.
Senator Al Zaibak: Thank you.
The Chair: To my Independent Senators Group colleague Senator Dasko, we have both been on this committee for a long time. I know that the matter of the war in Ukraine has been held close to your heart and overlapped greatly in the work we have been trying to do in this committee. Your contributions and leadership in this regard were always appreciated truly, particularly on the Russian disinformation report, as we heard recently.
Like our colleague, Senator Al Zaibak, your presence on this committee leaves some big shoes to fill. Thank you to both of you and, of course, to Senator Boehm, who is following up for Senator Kutcher.
Today, we continue our consideration of Bill C-11, An Act to amend the National Defence Act and other Acts.
Sensitive subjects, including trauma related to military service, sexual misconduct and harassment, may be discussed. This may be triggering to people in the room with us, as well as to those watching and listening to the broadcast.
Mental health support for all Canadians is available by phone and text at 9-8-8. If you are a member of the defence community, including Canadian Armed Forces members, you can call the defence community support and resource centre at 1-844-750-1648 for guidance and support services.
Senators and parliamentary employees are also reminded that the senators’ employment and family assistance program is available to them and offers short-term counselling for both personal and work-related concerns, as well as crisis counselling.
For those in the room, should you need support during this meeting, we do have a counsellor from Homewood Health who is here with us today. At any time during the meeting, please signal the clerk, and we will make sure that you have that support. The counsellor is presently outside of the room, but we have a plan in place.
Today, we will hear from two panels of witnesses. For our first panel, we are pleased to welcome, appearing as individuals, Major (Retired) Dr. Karen Breeck, Retired Medical Officer; Major (Retired) Donna Van Leusden, Survivor Perspectives Consulting Group; Corporal (Retired) Heather Vanderveer, a Canadian Armed Forces veteran; and Captain (Retired) Hélène Le Scelleur, PhD Candidate.
Thank you to all of you for your paths, experiences and the important testimony that you will bring to us today.
We will begin by inviting you to provide your opening remarks, followed by questions by our members. We will ask you to try to keep your remarks, the best you can, to six minutes. That being said, we ask you to take your time. We are here to listen and listen to you first.
We will begin with Dr. Karen Breeck. Welcome, and please proceed when you are ready.
Major (Ret’d) Dr. Karen Breeck, Retired Medical Officer, as an individual: Honourable senators, thank you for inviting me to speak today.
Bill C-11 reflects years of serious work that has been done by many dedicated people. I would like to think all of us are on the same team. We all want the same outcome. We want a Canadian Armed Forces, or CAF, where personnel trust that their workplace is safe, respectful and fair.
My concerns today are not modernization. Modernization is necessary. My concern is unmanaged modernization.
Parts of this bill are too focused on where legal files go and not focused enough on the people attached to those files. For CAF members, these files do not move in a vacuum. They directly affect people’s workplace safety, health, command responsibilities, unit cohesion and, ultimately, operational readiness.
CAF members deserve more than a jurisdictional handoff. They deserve a wraparound system that protects the complainant, treats the accused fairly, informs the commander and strengthens the institution.
If these files permanently leave the military system, who will manage the military workplace impacts? Who will provide the commanders the information they need to manage active safety risks, base housing, employment limitations and deployment taskings for both the complainant and the accused?
Civilian courts cannot manage these types of daily military realities. If passed as written, this bill separates these files from the military system without fully connected support, information-sharing, and a health-and-prevention framework being in place. That creates a dangerous gap between justice modernization and human realities — a gap that people, I am afraid, will fall into and be hurt by.
In effect, this bill asks to take us back to the pre-1998 military model. If we must go back to the future, Parliament must ensure the safeguards, data and accountability missing from the past are firmly locked in this bill. Modernization cannot mean simply replacing one incomplete system with another. As a physician, I see the Senate’s role of sober second thought as similar to the peer-review process in medicine. Peer review is how we reduce errors, identify hidden risks and protect people, including from groupthink.
When introducing a major new clinical treatment, we never assume it will work based on good intentions alone. We look for evidence first. We track outcomes, we monitor for unintended harms, and we adjust the treatment plan when required.
If I ever prescribed a treatment without evidence, and never checked whether it helped or harmed my patient, that would be a fundamental failure in my professional duty of care.
Bill C-11 prescribes a new treatment to CAF members without providing evidence it worked in the past nor mandating follow-up to prove it works in the future.
We are told to simply trust the process, but some of us have seen this movie before.
In November 2021, the Assistant Deputy Minister of Review Services reviewed the leadership’s claims of having fully implemented all 10 recommendations of the 2015 Deschamps report. While military leadership claimed a perfect 10 out of 10 completion rate, the independent auditors found exactly zero recommendations were fully complete and downgraded seven to be partially complete and three in the early planning stages.
Bureaucratic box checking does not equal operational reality. CAF members know this. We are trained to trust, but verify. Parliament must do the same.
Before making this transfer permanent, I urge the Senate to ask the hard questions: Ask for the data from the interim transfer period. Ask where the binding data-sharing MOUs are for all provinces, not just Ontario. Ask how commanders will receive the information they need to protect their units and to deconflict between complainants and accused in the same workplaces.
Ask who will train civilian actors in military culture awareness. It should never be the burden of the already traumatized victim to both navigate a new civilian system and simultaneously having to teach civilian actors about military realities.
The risk of failing CAF personnel with this bill is not abstract. Military sexual trauma has profound, long-lasting effects on health and well-being, and it significantly elevates risks of homelessness and suicide.
Before Parliament permanently transfers these workplace-related offences, has the government completed its due diligence? Has the government proven that the civilian model is ready, supported, measurable, safe and prevention-focused?
If not, I respectfully urge you to put people first: delete clauses 7 and 8 and allow the rest of the bill to move forward while we do the necessary work to get this part right.
Thank you. I welcome your questions.
The Chair: Thank you, Dr. Breeck.
Corporal (Ret’d) Heather Vanderveer, Co-founder of Alberta Recoil, as an individual: Honourable senators, I thank you for the opportunity to testify today. My name is Heather Vanderveer, and I’m a Canadian Armed Forces veteran, a survivor of military sexual trauma and the co-founder of Alberta Recoil, a veteran-owned organization that provides military sexual trauma-specific peer support and workshops for survivors. Today I want to speak about choice. Survivors have spent years telling decision makers that choice matters. Yet, Bill C-11 risks taking it away.
When I served, I was not given a meaningful choice. Reporting sexual misconduct was not a realistic option for many survivors of my generation. We understood the risks. Careers could be affected and reputations could be damaged. Too often, survivors became the problem instead of the misconduct being addressed. My choice was not whether to report. My choice was to remain silent or leave.
Eventually, I left. More than 30 years later, I continue to live with the consequences of that loss of autonomy. In my work, I see survivors across Canada carrying many of those same burdens. Many survivors continue to struggle not only with the original trauma, but also with the systems that left them feeling powerless when they needed support most. One of my statements from the parliamentary submission that was later quoted by members of Parliament was this:
Survivor autonomy is one of the strongest predictors of recovery after institutional betrayal and sexual trauma. Bill C-11 risks creating a system where survivors feel processed through the justice system rather than empowered within it.
I believe my statement is just as true today as when I first wrote it.
Sexual trauma is fundamentally about the loss of control. Healing requires rebuilding control. Choice is not a procedural issue. Choice is a healing issue. Survivors should have access to reporting pathways, legal remedies, support services and meaningful justice. Taking away those choices simply reduces survivor autonomy. What concerns me the most is that survivors have already told decision makers what they need, repeatedly and consistently, for years. The message has been remarkably consistent. Survivors want meaningful choice. Consultation matters.
For years, survivors have repeatedly identified what needs to change. The goal is not consultation itself. The goal is meaningful improvement in the lives of survivors. Success should not be measured by the number of reports produced, but whether survivors are experiencing greater trust, greater autonomy and better outcomes. It is also about trust. Survivors need to know when institutions ask them to speak; their voices are genuinely considered.
My concern today is not only for survivors, but for the young private, corporal, sailor, aviator or other officers who experience sexual misconduct five years from now. It is also for my daughter, who is currently serving as an aviator in the Canadian Armed Forces. Future generations of military members deserve a system where reporting is safe and meaningful, and choice remains with survivors, and complaints are taken seriously. Simply transferring responsibility to an already strained and broken civilian system does not fix the underlying problem. The psychological harm caused by institutional betrayal is often greater than the assault itself. Delays, dismissals and unclear processes and administrative failures increase post-traumatic stress severity, suicidality, moral injury and long-term disability. Reform must reduce harm, not compound it.
As Parliament considers clauses 7 and 8, including any proposed sunset clause, I encourage the members to place survivor trust, accountability and outcome at the centre of that decision. Future jurisdictional decisions should be guided by evidence, survivor experience and whether the system provides safe, effective and trauma-informed access to justice. If survivor autonomy is one of the strongest predictors of recovery, then we should be asking a very simple question: Why are we removing it?
My daughter is serving today. I do not want her generation to inherit the same system that failed mine. I do not want future generations of military members to face the impossible choice that I faced: Remain silent, or leave. Survivors have told decision makers what they need for years. The question before the Senate is whether it is prepared to act on what it has already heard. Too often survivors are thanked for being brave. We are thanked for being courageous. We are praised for coming forward, but being brave means very little if the choices that survivors are asking for are ultimately ignored. If survivor voices are truly valued, then our voices must help shape the decisions that affect them. The issue is not that survivors have failed to speak. The issue is whether decision makers are prepared to act on what they have already heard. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you.
Major (Ret’d) Donna Van Leusden, Survivor Perspectives Consulting Group, as an individual: Thank you for inviting me to speak today.
My name is Donna Van Leusden. I am a Canadian Armed Forces veteran and the co-founder of Survivor Perspectives Consulting Group, a national organization that teaches leaders, peers and communities how to support survivors of sexual violence.
Our work is rooted in several principles: Survivor support should never depend on the outcome of a legal process; we teach that a “not guilty” verdict does not mean “it did not happen” and that survivors deserve support regardless of whether there is an investigation, charges are laid or the judicial outcome.
That perspective informs everything I am about to say.
When I first reviewed Bill C-11, three concerns stood out to me: First, it removes meaningful choices from survivors; second, it transfers military sexual offence cases to a civilian justice system that is already under significant strain; and third, it assumes civilian courts are consistently trauma-informed when the evidence suggests they are not.
I remain concerned about all three.
For many years, survivors in the Canadian Armed Forces had limited or imperfect options, but they still had options. Under this bill, for Criminal Code sexual offences committed in Canada, survivors are effectively given none. Cases must proceed through civilian police and civilian courts, regardless of what the survivor needs, prefers or feels safest doing.
This is not trauma-informed, it is not survivor-centred and, in some respects, it provides less flexibility than the military system ever did. That matters because sexual violence removes agency. It is one of its defining characteristics. Someone takes bodily control away from you. Someone decides that your wishes no longer matter.
Any system that claims to be survivor-centred must, therefore, be careful not to replicate that harm. Survivor-centred justice should not mean deciding on behalf of survivors what is best for them. It should mean restoring agency wherever possible.
Choice matters, agency matters and healing matters.
At the same time, we must be honest about the realities of the civilian justice system, which would assume responsibility. Civilian courts are already overwhelmed. In 2017, approximately 15% of adult sexual assault cases exceeded the timelines established under Jordan. By 2023, that figure had doubled to approximately 30%. Nearly half of those delayed cases were ultimately stayed or withdrawn. We have already seen cases involving CAF members collapse because of Jordan delays.
At the same time, charge-laying rates have been decreasing. Between 2015 and 2019, the proportion of police-reported sexual assault cases that resulted in charges dropped from 42% to 36%.
More survivors are coming forward, but fewer cases are proceeding. Fewer survivors are receiving their day in court. The civilian system is not becoming less burdened; it is becoming more burdened. We need to be careful when comparing conviction rates between the military and civilian systems.
Civilian conviction rates for sexual assault appear higher than military conviction rates. At first glance, that may suggest a more effective system. However, the comparison is misleading because the civilian system filters cases extensively before they ever reach trial. A higher conviction rate does not necessarily mean a better system; sometimes, it just means a more selective one.
The final concern is one of trauma-informed justice. Civilian courts are not consistently trauma-informed. The recent Hockey Canada case illustrates this concern. In a lengthy and highly publicized decision, behaviours that trauma experts would recognize as common trauma responses, including fragmented memory, dissociation, delayed disclosure and inconsistent recall, were repeatedly treated as credibility concerns. That should concern all of us.
Survivors’ memories are often not linear; they are sensory, fragmented and disordered. That is not evidence that trauma did not occur; it is often evidence that it did. Yet, survivors continue to encounter systems that misunderstand these realities.
Another example is the Jacob Hoggard case. Nearly 10 years passed between the initial complaint and the conclusion — 10 years. For one survivor, that represented a decade of reliving the assault, waiting for answers, waiting for closure and existing in a state of uncertainty.
That is not justice; it is slow and grinding institutional harm, and it demonstrates the strain already facing civilian courts.
If all military sexual offence cases move into civilian systems, these challenges will not disappear; they may increase. Statistics can tell us whether a system is functioning, but survivors can tell us what that system feels like.
Allow me to share three experiences from my own life. The first involved a summary trial, which is the military system. I was questioned by my offender. I relived the assault under his authority. I relived the fact that I stood there alone, carrying his semen on my body, feeling abandoned. I remember thinking that the institution I served — the country I served — had abandoned me.
Yet, he was convicted in a case that would almost certainly never be prosecuted in the civilian system.
The second involved a senior officer who victimized more than one woman. Two of us came forward. Our experiences occurred a year apart. When the allegations surfaced, he simply declined to speak with police. No charges were laid.
The third involved a civilian court process. I was asked whether I wanted to proceed, and I said “yes.” The case was ultimately dismissed before plea. People later asked whether it had been worth it. My answer was “yes.”
For 25 years, I thought about my rapist every day. I was not the woman, mother, officer, daughter or sister I could have been. He stole that from me, and I bet he never thought about me once. But when he was arrested, when he had to retain counsel and when he was forced to answer for his actions, at least to his family, I finally received a measure of closure.
It mattered because I had a choice. That choice mattered to my healing.
For decades, survivors have been telling institutions exactly what would help — the Deschamps report, the Fish report, the Arbour report, the Heyder-Beattie Class Action settlement, media investigations, academic research, parliamentary studies and survivors themselves. We are not suffering from a lack of information; we are suffering from a lack of implementation.
The evidence exists, the recommendations exist and the solutions largely exist, but what has too often been missing is the willingness to implement them fully, consistently and with urgency.
Too often, survivors are treated as evidence rather than as people and as witnesses rather than as participants. In law, the case is not yours; it belongs to the Crown. Your memories become evidence. Your body becomes evidence. Your pain becomes evidence. All of it can be challenged, dissected and attacked.
By the end of the process, many survivors feel less like human beings and more like files moving through a system.
That is why trauma-informed systems matter. Survivors are not asking for special treatment; we are asking for informed treatment: trauma-informed training for judges, trauma-informed training for Crown attorneys, and trauma-informed training for court personnel and the Senate — rape shield protections that function in practice, not merely on paper, processes that preserve dignity, processes that reduce unnecessary harm and systems that understand the realities of trauma.
We must also be willing to explore new ways of restoring agency. Recently, I learned about initiatives such as Fourwords Solutions, which allows survivors to collect and preserve basic forensic evidence through self-administered kits. Predictably, there has been resistance, but I would ask you to consider what that resistance represents. Too often, our instinct is still to tell survivors what they can do, what they cannot do, what choices they are permitted to make and what decisions should be made on their behalf. We continue to infantilize the very people we claim to support.
If sexual violence takes away agency, then every opportunity to restore agency deserves serious consideration.
When I first began developing survivor-centred training programs, I was repeatedly told to reassure people that women in uniform were not fragile flowers. I have thought about that statement for years, and I disagree. We are fragile, just not in the way people assume. We are fragile because the years of being ignored, doubted, consulted, studied and disappointed create pressure, and the frustration survivors feel is not irrational. The anger we feel when a crisis line is renamed while the crisis itself continues is not irrational; it is the predictable result of repeatedly explaining what would help and watching institutions choose something else. Sometimes, it is watching them choose something that has already failed.
I still remember one of the first products developed after the launch of Operation HONOUR. It was a bookmark. On one side, it reminded people not to rape anyone, and on the other, it reminded people not to be raped. That was presented as progress.
Survivors remember things like that. We remember because we were there and because, too often, symbolic action has replaced meaningful action.
Yet, we continue to show up. We continue to participate. We continue to advocate. We continue to build solutions. And not because it is easy but because we believe things can improve.
So, I am asking the Senate to focus not only on where cases are heard but on how survivors are treated once they get there. Legal reform without trauma-informed reform will not deliver justice. Process reform without survivor agency will not deliver trust. Jurisdictional reform without cultural reform will not deliver outcomes.
We do not need another report. We do not need another study. We do not need another reorganization or another name change.
Survivors have already spent decades telling institutions what would help. We know what survivors need. The question before us is whether we are finally prepared to implement it because, if not, this risks becoming just another bookmark, another gesture, another promise and another way of telling survivors they have been heard while ensuring nothing really changes.
We deserve better than that.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you very much. Finally, Ms. Le Scelleur, please go ahead.
Captain (Ret’d) Hélène Le Scelleur, PhD Candidate, as an individual: Madam Chair and honourable senators, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. I appear before you as a survivor of sexual misconduct within the Canadian Armed Forces. I also appear before you as someone whose experience raises an important question about accountability that I believe remains unresolved.
I want to begin by stating clearly that I support the objectives of Bill C-11. I support ensuring that victims of sexual offences have access to a process that is independent, credible and worthy of their trust. I understand why these reforms were necessary, and I support the efforts to rebuild confidence among survivors.
I am not here to argue against these reforms; I am here because I believe there is a gap that remains insufficiently addressed. That gap arises when sexual misconduct and military abuse of power are inseparable.
My experience began with unwanted sexual conduct by a senior officer during a military wedding, attended by numerous members of the Canadian Armed Forces.
What happened that evening was serious, but what followed, ultimately, had the greatest impact on my life. This individual obtained access to my personal information; unwanted communications followed. The harassment continued into my workplace, operational environments, and, ultimately, my deployment to Afghanistan.
Looking back, I understand that what I experienced was not simply sexual misconduct; it was sexual misconduct enabled by military power; power associated with rank, authority, institutional access, and the ability to influence careers and professional reputations.
For years, I did not report what happened. I remained silent because I understood who held power and the consequences that could follow from challenging it.
That reality is central to my testimony today. The civilian justice system is designed to answer a fundamental question: Was a criminal offence committed? Victims deserve that answer.
But, in certain military cases, there is a second question that is equally important: How was military power used to make that misconduct possible? How was rank exploited? How was authority weaponized? How were institutional privileges used to facilitate predatory behaviour?
These questions matter because they concern leadership, trust, and the integrity of the institution itself. My concern is not that sexual offence cases are being transferred to the civilian justice system. My concern is, once transferred, we may assume accountability has been fully achieved.
A criminal process can determine guilt and impose punishment. What it does not necessarily examine is how military authority was abused, how institutional power contributed to the harm, or how organizational structures may have enabled that abuse.
Yet those questions are essential if we are serious, not only about responding to misconduct but also about preventing it. Without institutional accountability we risk addressing the offence while leaving untouched the conditions that allowed it to occur.
My experience also highlights another issue. Part of the conduct occurred during my deployment to Afghanistan. Military authority does not stop at Canada’s borders, neither do abuses of military authority. Members serving on deployments and international missions continue to live and work within military structures and chains of command.
While civilian courts may determine criminal responsibility, they are not positioned to examine the day-to-day exercise of military authority in operational environments. For some victims, including myself, those realities cannot easily be separated.
Honourable senators, much of the reform effort of recent years has been guided by a commitment to place victims at the centre of the system. I agree with that principle, but if victims are truly at the centre, then choice must be at the centre as well.
Some victims may wish to proceed exclusively through the civilian justice system, and that choice must be respected. But victims whose cases involve both sexual misconduct and military abuse of power should not be limited to a process that examines only one dimension of their experience. Their choices must be respected as well.
For that reason, I respectfully submit that Canada should establish an independent, specialized mechanism for cases involving both sexual misconduct and military abuse of power.
Such a mechanism should be independent of the chain of command. It should not replace civilian justice or criminal prosecution; rather, it should complement those processes by examining how military authority was exercised; whether institutional failures contributed to the harm; and whether leadership or organizational shortcomings require corrective action.
Unlike a criminal court, such a mechanism could focus on institutional learning, prevention, and accountability within the military environment itself. Most importantly, access to that mechanism should be available at the victim’s discretion.
I will conclude with this: For many years, I believed that reporting what had happened would cost me my career. That belief was rooted not in my understanding of the law, but in my understanding of power. In my case, it was not only the misconduct that silenced me, it was the power behind the misconduct.
Bill C-11 is an important step forward. But as you conclude your study, I respectfully ask you to consider whether the current framework is equipped to address both dimensions of the harm experienced by some military victims: not only the offence, but also the abuse of power that made the offence possible. If that dimension remains insufficiently addressed, then an important part of accountability remains unfinished.
Thank you. I look forward to your questions.
The Chair: Thank you very much. We are now going to proceed to questions from senators. Our guests will be here with us today until 12:10, and we will use this time to ask as many questions as we can, recognizing not everyone may get an opportunity to ask a question.
I would also like to ask that you identify to whom your question is directed, and keep the questions as succinct as possible in order for us to get through as many as possible.
Senator Patterson: First and foremost, thank you. It’s hard. Your stories are compelling, they are real, and we believe you.
I have a million questions, but I have limited time. What I really want to do, and, Maj. Dr. Breeck, you’re in the initial firing line, congratulations.
I want to go back to one of your comments about measuring. There is a lot of anecdotal — and we have heard this from other panels. I would like to know what you think needs to be measured if this transfer of cases going to the civilian system takes place, which I anticipate it will. How can we get survivors’ voices in there? What should we be measuring? Not just widgets and whatnots; we’re talking about outcomes.
Maj. Breeck: Thank you, Senator Patterson. I will assume, on behalf of this panel, we also want to acknowledge your service and your roles in supporting these issues as well. Thank you for all of your service as well.
I will not consider myself an expert for qualitative and quantitative measures, although I’m familiar with research and research processes.
The answer that comes to mind goes back to a person who was highly involved with the sexual misconduct class action, and I remember multiple times asking her, what is it that we’re asking for? How will we know when this is successful? How will we know when we have done enough and it’s as good as it can be?
Because sexual misconduct related issues, to me, are like suicide; every event is too many, but we still know it’s going to happen no matter what.
So what is success? Her answer — I have not gotten a better answer — was: until we have a system in place that makes sure every person knows what is and is not their rights, what is and isn’t wrong to have happened to them, and to know if something wrong has happened to them what their options are, and no matter what they choose as the option — to report or to not report — their career continues and their health continues as if they had taken the other objective, the other solution.
Until we have a system that is centred around the lived experience of the person who is the complainant and the accused — I must say I have known many of the accused as well. It has highly impacted their mental health and their families to have these accusations. It really is both sides. They’re both family members, and we need to be taking care of both.
So it’s doing research as well on the accused and not just on the complainant. We need to look at: Do they know their options? Are they feeling free to use what option is best for them? Are there repercussions, or can they go on with their careers? Can we make a report and move on and have our careers and our health?
Until we have research that actually identifies that, I think we’re always going to have a gap.
Senator Patterson: May I open this to see if anyone wishes to add, or would you like me to send it back? May I open it to the rest? Because each one of you has compelling cases, whether it’s abuse of authority linked to sexual misconduct from a survivor’s perspective, and also, Ms. Vanderveer, everything you talked about. Do you have some thoughts on what should be measured?
Cpl. Vanderveer: What comes to mind is this can’t just be a tick in the box for institutional convenience. It has to be — as we’ve said on this panel — survivor safety, survivor choice and that we aren’t doing further harm.
Because what I see in the work I do is that it is institutional betrayal after the fact that is doing the most harm. For most survivors, myself included, it’s not the initial incident; it’s what happens after. How do we stop that? How do we prevent future generations of soldiers having to deal with the same thing?
Maj. Van Leusden: For me personally, it comes down to the fact we don’t have the statistics gathered in Canada, but after The Invisible War in the States came out, they had a number of statistics. One was that one out of every two survivors will leave military service within a year without the proper support.
Considering the state of the CAF and its recruiting. We cannot afford to lose one out of two of anyone who joins the military. We must address that number. We need to make it so that people understand that being raped also doesn’t cost you your career, that you can stay in. Harm doesn’t go away; it heals. You will have a scar, but it doesn’t define you. You are just as competent and capable as before it happened. If you chose to ultimately cycle out, you do that knowing that we had your back. I think that’s what we have to be looking for.
[Translation]
Captain Le Scelleur: In my case, had I made a complaint, I would clearly have put an end to my career. It was about the direct chain of command. I was jeopardizing my mission.
Honestly, when we look at the seriousness of what I went through — and I’m being honest in telling you that I’m fortunate, because I wasn’t raped — perhaps we would end up with a civilian charge. However, what would be the repercussions in terms of the military?
We haven’t yet given enough thought to ways of deterring people from acting like this and using their authority. For me, the key is to ask ourselves whether something equivalent can happen or whether there are repercussions in the chain of command when we’re faced with offences of this nature.
[English]
Senator Al Zaibak: Thank you all for being here today, for your articulate statements and for sharing your perspectives with the committee. We recognize that discussing these issues can be difficult, and we appreciate your willingness to help us improve the system for future members of the Canadian Armed Forces.
All of us identify with the observations by Dr. Breeck. I was quite encouraged to hear from Minister McGuinty yesterday about the openness and willingness of the government to consider improvements advanced by the Senate. Thank you again for being here with us.
I have one question for all of you: Based on your experience, what is the single most important change that Bill C-11 could make to improve trust among victims and survivors so that we can take it into consideration to suggest amendments or improvements?
Maj. Breeck: If it was up to me — being aware that there are many other clauses and other areas, and that we’re focusing on clauses 7 and 8 — I don’t think we have it right yet. I don’t know how to fix it other than to take it out. Let everything that’s important move forward and then do it properly; that is, more centred on people’s needs to make sure, as we move forward, it’s done in a safe manner.
I’m pragmatic, though. I understand that’s unlikely. We have been using this system already for five years, so where is the data? The data is there. I can only assume the reason the data hasn’t been shared is because maybe it’s not positive.
I do have concerns about how long we wait for a sunset clause because it means more harm to people to gather the data that shows perhaps we could have done it better up front.
At the very least, we need some mechanisms to gather the data and be able to prove one way or the other if this is helping or harming, and have a mechanism to fix it in case it is not the best pathway forward.
Senator Al Zaibak: Thank you so much.
Maj. Van Leusden: Whatever process we move forward with, I’m very much encouraged that people be trained in trauma-informed support when somebody is disclosing and how to support somebody moving through the system. As of right now, nothing like that exists, and it should. It should be mandatory.
[Translation]
Captain Le Scelleur: I would like to add that we need to have the choice. If this choice weren’t possible, it would mean that my case would become practically invisible. Thank you.
[English]
Senator Al Zaibak: With respect to choice, some experts and specialists suggested giving the victims the choice of selecting military or civil courts. Is that what you are suggesting? Is that part of your suggestion?
[Translation]
Captain Le Scelleur: I think that we need an independent mechanism. The chain of command shouldn’t be responsible for taking the law into its own hands in cases of misconduct. When I say choice, I mean that the person can choose which path to take to address the situation, but also that we can provide a truly independent mechanism to deal with the abuse of power.
Senator Carignan: Thank you for your testimonies. I find them extremely moving. I want to thank you for your generosity. You’re doing this selflessly for the Canadian Armed Forces as a whole and for the people who may be affected either now or in the future.
My question is for Dr. Breeck and Ms. Van Leusden. You touched on an aspect that bothers me with the bill. This aspect is the potential negative impact, particularly as a result of the Jordan ruling. I put the question yesterday to the witnesses who were there. There haven’t been any cases in the military justice system related to the Jordan ruling where proceedings were terminated, except for one exceptional case that didn’t involve sexual matters.
When we look at the report entitled Rethinking Justice for Survivors of Sexual Violence from the ombudsperson for victims, it’s shocking to see that 268 sexual assault cases in Canada have been stayed in civilian court because of time limits tied to the Jordan ruling and that court proceedings for sexual assaults that exceeded the time limits set by the Jordan ruling rose from 15% in 2016 to 30% in 2022-23.
I would like to hear your thoughts on the anticipated impact of transferring cases and having victims end up in Jordan cases or entangled in civilian proceedings because they didn’t use the court martial system, which seems faster. What do you think the consequences will be for the victims? We realize that we’re clogging up the system for civilian victims as well, since this also creates a domino effect. I would like to hear your thoughts on this topic.
Maj. Van Leusden: It’s a really terrible consequence for the victims. They showed a great deal of courage in discussing what happened. I know two people who, because of the Jordan ruling —
[English]
— their files fell apart, and as a result, the consequences were devastating.
I do my best with the people that I’m supporting through the system to reinforce that “not guilty” is not the same as innocent, that not guilty doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen. Even so, there are so many survivors that depend on that and think that having that moment in court is going to make a huge difference in their healing. For some of them, it does. To have it just fall apart because paperwork wasn’t filed in time or because they couldn’t find room on a calendar is so devastating because, again, now they are in limbo. They haven’t gotten a formal declaration of guilty or not guilty. Nothing has happened, and it just sort of goes away.
The two I know are both struggling, and I don’t see them coming around to any sort of meaningful recovery for some time as a result of that. I, personally, was fortunate. I didn’t happen to me. My cases were still dismissed, but at least it wasn’t the result of a paperwork snafu.
It is a very real concern with sexual assault cases because they already come in feeling violated, alone and abandoned, and then to have it fall apart because of a timing thing — which I understand is very important, and I don’t disagree with people having the right to a speedy process.
Maj. Breeck: My apologies for speaking in English.
Senator Carignan: That’s your constitutional right. I use it every day.
Maj. Breeck: I would like to reframe this on the importance of being strategic when looking at this. In my time in the military, it was before the Defence Community Support and Resource Centre, or DCSRC, formerly the Sexual Misconduct Response Centre, existed, so as medical officers, we were often the first point of contact for a number of these kinds of issues.
In my lived experience, again, I think it is really important to remember it is not just about sexual assault. This is about voyeurism. This is about indecent exposure. This is about non‑consensual publication of intimate visions. There are a lot of issues other than sexual assault that are happening every day in the Canadian Forces because we are operational, because we are sharing tents and sharing bathrooms. These things happen, unintentionally, every day. The question then is: When is it bad versus unintentional, and how can we address that immediately so that it doesn’t escalate? Because when these small things happen and there is nowhere to go and nowhere to report it, it creates a permissive environment that allows the issues to get bigger and bigger.
In my lived experience, I support what Captain Le Scelleur has been saying. These events don’t happen in isolation. They happen together with stalking and criminal harassment, which isn’t on this list. There is a whole pile of other crimes that are interrelated in these events that, again, we’re really afraid will just get silenced and lost because everyone is going to say, “One of the six things that happened to you is sexual, so we’re hands off because that’s going to civilian.” Well, what happens to all the other parts of the event? They are going to disappear. When we’re talking about 281 cases, I would say, no, we’re talking much bigger because there are many different issues here to put all the numbers together.
At the end of the day, with things like the Jordan principle, how is this helping not only the individual but the institution? Because that means potentially we have a bad apple, and we’re handing them back to the institution, which we can almost guarantee means repeat offences within the family. How is this bill going to help prevent that?
Senator Carignan: Thank you.
Senator Cardozo: This is slightly difficult emotionally for us, and we know it is immensely more difficult for you to be here, not to mention the years that you have been plagued with problems that were not of your making in any way.
I have a very simple question, and I will try and keep it really brief and technical. In terms of an amendment, I see three options, apart from rejecting the bill. The first would be to have a sunset clause that could come into effect three years from now after we gather a certain amount of data and information. The second would be to pass the bill, but delay the coming into force of clauses 7, 8 and 60. The third would be to pass the bill and have sections 7 and 8 go into effect but still maintain a choice for individuals as to whether they wanted to go through the civilian system or maintain the military justice system.
I just want to comment. I thought the problem we are dealing with here was the military justice system, but that is being unfair. I think it is far more complex than that. Thank you.
Maj. Breeck: I would strongly encourage exactly what you said. Especially for people that don’t have lived experience in the military, this is a highly complicated area that is rarely black and white and, therefore, doesn’t fill well into a black and white bill. There are nuances that will have significant life impacts if they haven’t been thought through, so I am very concerned about second- and third-order ripple effects that don’t appear to have been fully discussed in the preparation of this bill.
As far as your differing options, I know, for me, some of those options sound legal. In our next panel, I know you have someone — Colonel Bruce MacGregor, Former Director of Military Prosecutions — that I think would be able to give more insight into that.
The Chair: Thank you very much.
Senator Hay: Thank you, all of you. I understand and heard what you said around choice and agency being paramount. That’s what you need. I also see that incredible courage and bravery that you don’t need us to say. I see so much strength in vulnerability.
I am also thinking about trauma. It is silent, and it has triggers. It doesn’t go away just because we finished a case. It is an evolution in one’s life, and also one’s family. Sexual assault is a different kind of trauma. I’m just speaking of my past with mental health and Women’s College Hospital.
I want to ask the same question I asked yesterday because I was struck by what you had said, Major Dr. Breeck, that Bill C-11 is too focused on the files and not enough on the people. My question yesterday was: What happens with the victim once the cases are off-loaded or moved over to the justice system? I’m thinking of the victim when they go off to another system. How are they supported through that transition into this, I would call it, yet again, another intimidating system and a place of retraumatization and not necessarily being seen?
Then I’m following that up with the following. What happens to the victim survivor with their career? I see four extraordinary humans who are not in the military right now. So what happens with their career? What support or promised support is there for the victim in this process and if it is off-loaded?
Maj. Van Leusden: The single biggest impact that anyone can have is at the support at first disclosure. That means the first time that someone says, “This thing happened to me,” how they are responded to will set the stage for how they recover. When done properly, we can support survivors to the point that they go through the process feeling strong and supported and secure and stable, regardless of if they end up through the military system or civilian system, but that training is not everywhere, unfortunately.
It continues to be something that we push for, recognizing how important it is. Because closure is often not found in the courtroom, regardless of what system you go through. It remains very hard to get a successful prosecution in sexual assault cases.
We do our best to encourage people that have been victimized to seek closure outside of the courtroom. That said, they often still, sort of, look at that moment because they want to hear that their stories matter, that their pain matters.
We need to make sure that more people know how to support each other, because you are right: Being raped shouldn’t cost you your career. It shouldn’t be the end of a dream, and it often is.
Cpl. Vanderveer: I would like to add to that as well, too, please.
What I see in my work with peer support is that the attitude right now seems to be, “Well, after this happens, there is the Sexual Misconduct Support and Resource Centre, or SMSRC — and I know they have now changed their name, and I apologize because I don’t have it memorized yet. The problem with their programs is that they are only an eight-week program, and they are only a coffee group. They do not offer the long-term supports and services that survivors need. This is how my business came to be because we saw there was no adequate peer support, and we created this group in 2020.
We are also the only agency I know that offers three-day sexual assault workshops for survivors. But it is hard, because it is not getting out there to the people we need. There is not enough funding to provide these workshops and supports.
Again, the attitude seems to be that, “Well, we just put it in the civilian court system, but we have the SMSRC.” But we know they have reduced their 24-hour line. Their eight-week groups are just not enough, so we really see people who are struggling, and I have heard stories from some of our clients who are resorting to chat for support because they can’t get a psychologist, or they can’t attend peer support, or the SMSRC’s peer support has put them off of seeking any help.
Maj. Breeck: If I could add a short shout out there, when we’re in the military, we have to use the military medical system, which, again, is very different than in the civilian world. We have a lot of power as a medical officer inside the system, and we’re a very trusted component, hopefully, within the system.
It might be a surprise that when we look at things like the comprehensive report of now Her Excellency the Right Honourable Louise Arbour, medical was not included in there. That was viewed as being outside of her mandate. Although the word says “comprehensive,” it did not include all aspects of the military. There are big gaps in military culture and military resources, even within the confines of her report.
When we look at things like, even yesterday, we had very significant Canadian Armed Forces representation but not from medical. Medical was not there. The Surgeon General was not there. The voice of culture was there but not of medical. Our voices of how we can help in support and be part of this process are often not included in these conversations, which, again, I think causes a lot of the second-hand and third-hand ripple effects because usually it is our role to say, “Where does the human fit in?”
We’re usually the advisers to the chain of command on how this will impact the human, and because this is viewed as a culture issue, we’re often not at those tables. That voice of how this is impacting the human has been siloed through a large degree of this bill and through these conversations.
Again, I would do a shout out that we need to put the human back into these bills.
The Chair: Thank you very much. We are going to have to finish our questioning there and suspend to prepare for our next panel.
I would like to let you know — because this may be helpful — that not everybody has been able to appear in this room at these hearings, but we’re having some very fulsome submissions coming in that represent some of the groups that you may or may not be aware of. We are trying to find ways to have the kinds of things that you are talking about, at least, somewhat addressed. I wanted to let you know that.
Thank you again. We are very grateful for each of you and your supports being here today and for the open and honest testimony you have provided.
For the final panel of the meeting, we are pleased to welcome Colonel (retired) Bruce MacGregor, former director of military prosecutions; Dr. Megan MacKenzie, Professor and Simons Chair in Peace, Disarmament and Human Security, as an individual; and Chief Constable Fiona Wilson, Victoria Police Department appearing on behalf of the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police.
We know that time is an issue for our virtual guests, and we will do our best and hope you can stay until the very last moment possible today. Thank you for joining us.
We will begin by inviting you to provide your opening remarks to be followed by questions from our members. I remind you that each of you has five minutes of opening comments. We will begin with Colonel Bruce MacGregor.
Colonel (Ret’d) Bruce MacGregor, Former Director of Military Prosecutions, as an individual: Thank you, Madam Chair. I will have a short preamble before I get into my opening statement. My opening statement will not be a rant. I actually do have some sort of road map that might be something that the Senate can hear at the end of this when we have questions. So I do have that.
I also want to mention that the tone that I think we are hearing today was sort of set yesterday by our Prime Minister when he was addressing the public about the appointment of the new Governor General. He said:
At a time when much of the world is buffeted by crises and the worst are full of passionate intensity, Canada’s history, our institutions, and our enduring traditions matter more than ever.
We retain our convictions. We reinforce our institutions.
He was quoting, of course, William Butler Yeats. I think our institutions in this case are the military justice system, and the crisis we are dealing with is, obviously, the scourge of sexual violence.
On to that, I will read my statement.
Honourable senators, Madam Chair, I am the former director of military prosecutions from 2014 to 2021. I support Bill C-11’s core objective: to strengthen independence of military justice actors and enhance support for victims of sexual offences. These independence reforms are essential, and I commend them.
However, I respectfully oppose clauses 7 and 8, which remove sexual offence jurisdiction from the military system when committed domestically. This amendment would harm victims rather than help them, and it is inconsistent with the discipline, efficiency and morale of the Canadian Armed Forces.
The core problem: selective distrust. The amendment removes sexual offence jurisdiction while retaining military jurisdiction over assault, fraud and harassment. This sends a conflicting message: We trust this system for assault, et cetera, but not for sexual assault. What does that tell victims of non-sexual assault? It declares the system fundamentally broken and broken enough to remove sexual offence jurisdiction entirely, while asking other victims to trust it completely.
If Bill C-11’s independence reforms truly fix the system — and I believe they do — we should trust it across the board. If we don’t trust it with sexual offences, we haven’t fixed the problem. We’ve hidden it.
Victim agency and choice. Justice Arbour argued that offering victims choice burdens them. I disagree. Many victims prefer the military justice system because it contextualizes military culture and operates where they serve. The Declaration of Victims Rights encourages victim involvement. These are CAF members professionally trained to make decisions. The improvements from Bill C-77 gave them more accessible information and legal assistance to make those choices. Bill C-11’s removal of that informed choice is simply patronizing to professional women and men in uniform.
Now, what has the Supreme Court said?
In Moriarity and Stillman, the Supreme Court upheld concurrent military jurisdiction over Criminal Code offences, including sexual assault, as constitutional and necessary. The majority in Stillman called the military justice system “a full partner in administering justice.” The court noted that serious offences streamed to civilian courts “might not truly account for the seriousness of such offences,” in a military context. Clauses 7 and 8 contradict this consistent validation by the Supreme Court.
Now, operational readiness and national security. Civilian authorities reject cases due to resource constraints, and we will hear more about that today.
The military justice system is portable, designed to operate in remote bases, overseas deployments and war zones where the offence took place and where civilian justice actors cannot easily locate.
The military system prosecutes most of these cases regardless of severity and cost. This is not a weakness. It is a commitment to accountability and to operational readiness.
Prime Minister Carney recently warned of an increasingly dangerous world requiring military readiness for prolonged overseas operations. Downgrading military justice capacity degrades operational readiness and discipline enforcement. As Somalia demonstrated, military justice must be current and engaged to ensure mission success and to maintain our obligations to allies.
In conclusion, Bill C-11’s reforms to support victims and enhance independence are essential. But removing jurisdiction on sexual offences discards the tools that serve victims better. More fundamentally, it undermines the entire system’s legitimacy by declaring one offence category too broken to trust, while asking other victims to trust the military justice system.
The Supreme Court has validated military jurisdiction over criminal offences, including those of a sexual nature. Justice Fish and Justice Deschamps recommended strengthening the military justice system, not abandoning jurisdiction over sexual offences.
I urge this committee to pass the independence reforms while rejecting the jurisdictional transfer.
I welcome your questions. Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you very much. I will go to Chief Wilson next, please.
Fiona Wilson, Chief Constable, Victoria Police Department, Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police: Good afternoon. Thank you, chair and members of the committee, for the opportunity to speak today.
I want to begin by acknowledging the important work that has been done across the Canadian Armed Forces; the Department of National Defence; by survivors, some of whom we heard from earlier today; and by external reviewers to improve how allegations of sexual misconduct are addressed.
Survivors and stakeholders have raised serious concerns about independence, transparency, accountability and trust. The reports by Justices Deschamps, Fish and Arbour reflect a genuine effort to understand those concerns and to recommend reforms that meet the needs of survivors better.
I support the objective of strengthening independence, transparency, survivor confidence and trauma-informed practice. I also support civilian police leading these investigations, where that is the most appropriate course.
What I must be direct about is the operational implications of Bill C-11 for civilian police services, including the Victoria Police Department, or VicPD, with respect to the importance of preserving flexibility, collaboration and discretion.
As drafted, Bill C-11 would remove Canadian Armed Forces jurisdiction to investigate Criminal Code offences alleged to have been committed in Canada that are of a sexual nature or committed for a sexual purpose. It would also remove the jurisdiction of the military justice system to try those offences.
The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police has taken a clear position on this issue. The CACP strongly recommends maintaining concurrent jurisdiction. This is not because civilian police agencies are unable to investigate serious sexual offences. We are. These are critically important investigations, and they must be handled professionally, independently and with the highest degree of care for survivors.
The concern is that a mandatory transfer model removes discretion, limits collaboration and assumes that every civilian police service is automatically the most appropriate agency to conduct every investigation. In practice, policing does not work that way.
Across Canada, police agencies regularly refer investigations to one another when specialized expertise, resources, geography, conflicts of interest or public confidence require it.
Consideration of autonomy and choice for survivors is also consistent with a critical trauma-informed approach. That flexibility improves outcomes and allows police leaders to determine which agency is best positioned to conduct a timely, thorough and trauma-informed investigation.
The same flexibility should exist between civilian police services and the Canadian Armed Forces Military Police.
The Victoria Police Department’s involvement with this issue began in 2021 when local military police commanders were directed to transfer current and new sexual-offence files to civilian agencies. In Victoria, that request arrived with little notice, limited consultation and very limited data, primarily that we might expect approximately eleven files per year.
From the onset, police have advised that we could not assume responsibility for these investigations without additional resources. File counts significantly understate the real workload.
A single sexual offence investigation can require hundreds of investigative hours, trauma-informed support for survivors, digital and forensic analysis and coordinated efforts across multiple jurisdictions.
Canadian Armed Forces-related files can be particularly complex. Witnesses and evidence may be located in different countries or provinces. Relevant information may sit within military systems.
Service records, disciplinary history, prior conduct, deployment information and workplace context may all be relevant to the investigation.
If civilian police are expected to investigate these matters, it must have timely and complete access to all relevant information.
Agencies have identified the complexity of these investigations and the absence of a coordinated framework to support a transfer of this magnitude.
Taking on these files without additional resources would require diverting investigators from existing sexual assault cases and other critical public-safety responsibilities. We were, and remain, clear that this would not be responsible policing.
To ensure Bill C-11 succeeds, I would offer four recommendations.
First, Parliament should maintain concurrent jurisdiction. Civilian police should be able to investigate these files where appropriate, but CAF Military Police should not be categorically prohibited from doing so.
The decision should be guided by independence, survivor preference, investigative complexity, public confidence, conflicts of interest and the agency that is best positioned to conduct the investigation.
Second, there must be a coordinated national framework. Consistent MOUs, information-sharing protocols, file-transfer standards, victim-support pathways, procedures for warrants on DND property and clear expectations for cooperation between civilian police and CAF Military Police are essential.
Third, a dedicated federal funding stream would be required. This must support additional investigators, analysts and victim-centred resources in communities with significant CAF presence, as well as the specialized training and investigative expenses associated with national and international files.
Finally, civilian police must have timely access to all relevant military records and information. If responsibility is transferred, then the investigative tools, information and context required to conduct a complete investigation must be transferred with it.
In closing, Bill C-11 is intended to strengthen trust and improve the response to sexual misconduct within the Canadian Armed Forces. I support that objective.
The strongest model is one that preserves independence, protects survivor choice, supports collaboration, ensures access to information and provides resources required to do the work properly.
If Parliament intends civilian police to assume greater responsibility for these investigations, it must also ensure that police services have the authority, information, resources and framework required to meet that responsibility effectively.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you, Chief Wilson.
I would like to go now to Dr. Megan MacKenzie.
Megan MacKenzie, Professor and Simons Chair in Peace, Disarmament and Human Security, as an individual: Thank you, chair, and members of the committee, for the invitation to appear today.
I want to acknowledge the service and expertise of the first panellists, and I appreciate their insights. Their stories matter. I believe them, and they are experts.
Indeed, there is no perfect system to handle sexual violence, military or civilian.
The civilian system is still evolving. Prosecution rates remain low. Victim support remains imperfect. There remain stereotypes and obstacles that prevent victims from wanting to come forward.
I appreciate the concerns raised about handling military sexual violence over to an imperfect system. There remain unanswered questions about how to manage the transfer in a way that supports service members.
I acknowledge that victims need choice and a much richer range of support and resources than the civilian system provides.
I agree we still need to address abuse of power and the cultural environments that foster sexual violence within the CAF.
The transfer to the civilian system cannot be a means of letting the CAF off the hook when it comes to addressing sexual violence and supporting victims.
Transfer to the civilian system cannot take place without acknowledging how much support and reform the civilian system still needs to avoid Jordan delays and to address low conviction rates and other concerns raised by survivors.
I still think transferring to the civilian system is a better option than the status quo. I am in support of a sunset clause that would allow us to review data on what the impacts of this transfer have been for victims.
A transfer cannot be a washing of hands when it comes to military sexual violence. It should be part of a series of efforts that are constantly being improved and reviewed with victims in mind.
A reminder that, historically, a separate military justice system has only been justified on the basis that the military should be held to a higher standard of conduct because of the responsibilities entrusted to its members.
After years of recurring scandals, persistent reports of sexual misconduct, concerns about retaliation and repeated findings from independent reviews, it is difficult to conclude that the military justice system has met that higher standard with respect to sexual violence.
We have ample data that one of the main reasons Canadian Armed Forces members are not currently reporting sexual violence is they do not trust the institution to handle the cases.
Our Statistics Canada data shows that only 21% of Regular Force members who experience sexual assault report it. That’s actually lower than the reporting rate in 2018. The most common reasons for not reporting were a belief that reporting would not make a difference and a fear of negative consequences.
Research consistently shows that confidence in reporting and accountability in the system matters. When victims believe reporting will not make a difference, and when offenders perceive a low likelihood of consequences, conditions of impunity emerge. Reducing impunity is, therefore, an important part of preventing future misconduct.
This provision of Bill C-11, the transfer of jurisdiction over the Criminal Code sexual offences, is the culmination of years of independent review, expert consultation and public investment.
The recommendation did not start with this bill, and it didn’t even start with the review led by former Supreme Court justice, current Governor General, Louise Arbour in 2021.
In 2015, as others have mentioned, Justice Marie Deschamps concluded that the military’s response to sexual misconduct suffered from a lack of independence and trust. Her recommendation was more complex, but it was still about having independence to the chain of command.
The Deschamps review took approximately 18 months, involved extensive consultation with military members, survivors and subject matter experts and reportedly cost approximately $1 million.
We know, in 2021, Her Excellency the Right Honourable Louise Arbour reached the clearest conclusion. Recommendation five of the Arbour report called for Criminal Code sexual offences committed by Canadian Armed Forces members to be removed from military jurisdiction and handled by civilian authorities. The report also emphasized the importance of independent support for victims and survivors.
This review involved, again, nearly two years of investigations and consultation with military members, survivors, advocates, legal experts, academics and practitioners. Having participated in those consultations, I was struck by both the depth of engagement undertaken by her and her team, and the consistency with which many of the same concerns surfaced across reviews that had been completed over a decade earlier.
Bill C-11 gives effect to the most consequential of those recommendations. The question before Parliament is no longer whether experts agree. I think it’s really that this has been repeatedly answered. The question is whether Parliament is prepared to implement the recommendations that successive independent reviews have already made.
I think that this transfer would send a clear message to survivors that their cases will be handled through a system that’s independent of the military chain of command. It acknowledges what successive independent reviews have found; that confidence in the military’s handling of sexual violence has been seriously undermined, and that meaningful reform requires greater independence. Most importantly, it moves Canada closer to a system that prioritizes victim confidence, transparency and accountability.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you very much. We appreciate that. Thank you to all of our witnesses for speaking.
I’d like to proceed to questions at this moment. If you could keep it tight and timely, that would be very helpful.
Senator Yussuff: Thank you to all of you for being here. We’re in this late stage of this bill. It has been heard in the house. There were amendments made. It now arrives here, and we are having to do our own scrutiny of the bill and hear the witnesses.
To say that we have heard some very contradictory evidence by victims and those who have come before the committee would be an understatement, and we don’t have a lot more time.
It is clear that this bill was designed essentially to bring some remedies to victims, whom the system failed, to a large extent. Given that reality, where do we go from here? Based on what we have heard, deleting clauses 7 and 8 would provide choices for people to do so. In some cases, some say we will keep clauses 7 and 8 but have a sunset clause with the collecting data that would at least inform whether the system is working or not working.
Last night, we also heard testimony that some data is available. It is maybe not perfect, but it revealed the success and failure of how prosecutions are happening.
The civilian system in this country has never been perfect. It’s still evolving, and many people argue that it has failed them miserably. Others say it is very successful in the context of prosecution, given democracy is the only system we have for civilians in this country.
How do we make sense of what has been presented? We also heard from the police associations that they want to have the tools and the resources necessary to do what they’re asked to do at the end of the day. I’m going to ask each one if you could comment briefly in regard to your testimony. Help us understand as we get to the end trying to fill out what we will do with the bill as we get there.
Col. MacGregor: Perhaps I can start because I’m local. There are a number of things that can be done. Senator Cardozo had mentioned three of those potential options. One is to eliminate clauses 7 and 8 before this goes back to the House. That’s something that I’m in favour of, but given the political realities — another suggestion that I have seen in the past and on policy work that I’ve done is pass clauses 7 and 8 but agree not to have it come into force. That is something that is doable.
I’m not as in favour of the sunset clause, but if that is the saw-off — because we heard the minister yesterday say well, that might be something that’s available.
I’m going to give you a fourth road map that has been used not this Senate committee, but by SCOCA when I was involved back in 2008-09. I believe that SCOCA is the old acronym for the then Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs.
Back in 2008, we had the Trépanier decision from the Court Martial Appeal Court of Canada. That rules the system unconstitutional immediately. So it was a full stop for courts martial. The issue was the fact that the Director of Military Prosecutions was the one who had the ability to choose what type of court martial it was going to be with a panel or military judge alone. That had immediate effect, and that was an emergency, a crisis.
The Minister of National Defence at that time was saying how do we deal with this? So they spun up Bill C-60 at that time, and the saw-off with the minister pushing it through the Senate committee was, “I’ll send you a letter.”
I’m going to read from the 2009 Senate committee report, which is entitled Equal Justice: Reforming Canada’s System of Courts Martial, dated May 2009, from the Senate committee. I think you really need to see this. Page 2 sets out how we got there. How did this end up happening so that with Bill C-60 they added a clause — section 28 of the act, Bill C-60 — that sets out that it’s going to be an automatic review by the Senate committee.
They forced the minister to write a letter to the Senate. The minister at the time said:
I would ask, however, that your committee consider studying the provisions and operation of Bill C-60 and provide me with a report on your findings and any recommendations the committee may choose to make by December 31, 2008. The government will review these recommendations and provide the committee with a written response that could include proposed amendments within 90 calendar days.
The Chair: Thank you. A gentle reminder that our witness, Dr. MacKenzie, has a full stop at one o’clock, and the time is now 12:47.
[Translation]
Senator Carignan: I’m listening to you. I can see that the legal profession, the police chiefs and the witnesses who appeared a bit earlier all agree fairly strongly on this.
Option 1 is to maintain the victims’ choice between the civilian process and the military justice system. That’s my understanding. Everyone or almost everyone is saying this.
There’s the matter of the sunset clause, which I’m not considering. I’ve seen too many pieces of legislation with these provisions that were never studied afterwards. The Senate of Canada doesn’t need to lose option A, which is the one recommended by all the witnesses. We amend the bill and send it back to the other place. They can then decide whether to keep it as is.
Did I understand correctly that option A best reflects your point of view?
[English]
The Chair: Senator Carignan would like to hear your answers, but I would remind senators that both Ms. Wilson and Dr. MacKenzie have full stops at one o’clock. If you wanted that question asked to them also, I ask that we ask them first.
Col. MacGregor: I can answer that quickly, chair. Yes, that is my ultimate response to this because it has too many other ramifications and too many other consequential damages as a result of this going ahead, and we’ve heard it from the victims themselves.
Ms. Wilson: Thank you for the question. I think you have a very difficult path ahead of you because of so many diverse opinions with respect to this matter.
What I can say — from a policing perspective — is that anything that undermines survivors’ choice is less than ideal; the proposal that’s being made does just that. I would say, if you want to take a victim-centred approach and focus on survivors, make sure you are providing them with as much choice, power and control in this process as possible.
It’s very common for different police jurisdictions to work together and lean on each other for support with investigations — for all those reasons I spoke about in my opening comments — whether it’s in the public interest, a conflict, for deconfliction purposes, and resourcing considerations. Moving forward, I see a scenario where we are able to do that — with the right mechanisms in place — with the CAF for these investigations. To me, that would be an ideal outcome.
Ms. MacKenzie: I agree, from what our past panel has said, and also with a recent statement, that choice is ideal. What I would highlight is that there are limits to that choice, especially when it comes to the way the Canadian Armed Forces operates.
If you think about 2021, we had 12 senior members of the Canadian Armed Forces facing allegations of sexual misconduct. We have a system where the Canadian Forces Provost Marshal, the head of the Military Police, is appointed by the chief of the defence staff. That’s a system where the choice may not serve justice well. When you have senior members of the Canadian Armed Forces being investigated by peers and investigated by someone they may have gone to the academies with, it may benefit other victims, but for senior members of the defence forces it does not get around this investigation of peers and potential abuse of power.
The Chair: Thank you. We have about eight minutes left, virtually.
Senator Cardozo: I think my questions have been answered in the last few comments.
I don’t want to ask a question, but just to say this has been a very interesting panel. Special thanks to Chief Wilson, because I think you brought in the other aspect of the difficulty of transferring it over to the civilian side. Thank you.
Senator Patterson: I am the sponsor of the bill, and I am going to sum up what I’ve heard. For Dr. MacKenzie, just to clarify, there are other components in this bill that take the military police completely out of the chain of command, appointed by the Governor-in-Council and reporting to the minister. So independence, under Justice Fish, has been addressed in that bill. And I think Col. MacGregor did allude to that, just to give you some reassurance.
Of course I have many questions, but I will start quickly with Chief Wilson. You talked about concurrent jurisdiction. The thing brought up yesterday was that military police do start investigations and provide victim services. That concurrent jurisdiction, unlike in 1998, is now gone; with this bill it goes away. Did I hear you say you think there is value to concurrent police jurisdiction in this case?
Then my follow-on question is for Col. MacGregor, and it addresses the issue that Capt. Le Scelleur brought up when there is abuse of authority with a potential criminal sexual offence. How does the military justice system address that better than the civilian system? I’ll pass to Chief Wilson first. Thank you.
Ms. Wilson: Thank you for the question. The CACP is not in favour of prohibiting the CAF from proceeding with these investigations. However, there may be circumstances — and Dr. MacKenzie referenced one in particular — where it is appropriate for a civilian police agency to take over an investigation. So having that choice, not just from a victim’s perspective but from a practical perspective with respect to all of these factors — resourcing; conflict is a really important one; public perception of independence; public interest. Those are all reasons why I think there are circumstances where it would be appropriate.
In those circumstances, all of those other guardrails, in my mind, have to be in place; resourcing, an MOU in place, and access to the correct information or investigative material the civilian police would require to conduct a thorough investigation.
Col. MacGregor: Through the chair, the Federal, Provincial and Territorial Heads of Prosecution Committee have come up with a statement of principles and presumptions for the exercise of concurrent jurisdiction by Canadian prosecuting authorities, and they have set that out in terms of who is best able to do the prosecution. So that question you had would come into effect, and it would be discussed between the head of prosecution from the particular province, or the Feds, and the Director of Military Prosecutions, so that would factor in.
To answer the other question about the abuse of authority as part of the actual sexual violence that took place, I think the court martial system is much better prepared to deal with that in an open and transparent way, particularly in the unit in which it took place.
Because courts martial are not hidden behind closed doors, or off the base, or in another province away from where the victim or the perpetrator is, they are within the units.
One thing that wasn’t discussed yesterday is the fact that these are portable trials and are located where the most affected aspect of the case takes place. It is open for the units and for the chain of command to hear all of the evidence.
Notoriously, sexual assault is very difficult to secure a conviction. What happens, and what I’ve seen throughout my career — both in the civilian defence career on sexual assaults, as well as throughout my career in the military as a prosecutor — is sexual assaults — more often than not — lead to an acquittal, and the accused walks away. People that didn’t appear or didn’t witness what took place in that trial, and did not hear all of the facts, including the abuse of authority, think the victim made it up and the accused is innocent. Well, there is a lot more to the facts than meets the eye. And when they walk back into their unit, high-five each other and say, so-and-so was making it up.
Well, if you have it within the unit, you have an audience, you have it open and transparent, and you hear all the facts. Yes, at the end of the day, it might be an acquittal, but there are certain facts that lead to acquittals that it’s unsafe, beyond a reasonable doubt, to secure a conviction.
The Chair: Thank you.
Senator Busson: My question is for Chief Wilson. It’s great to see you again, chief. I’m so proud of what you’re doing there in Victoria.
I just wanted to go over your testimony very quickly, which was very realistic and pragmatic, about the responsibility of police and the position of the CACP with regard to the hand-over, if jurisdiction was handed over solely to civilian police in this situation.
You articulated very well the fact that jurisdiction, access and resources matter, and, generally, it’s not just a flick of a switch, and something happens like that, and I thank you for that testimony.
Briefly, changes to Bill C-11, among other things, want to be more victim-centred, want to pay more attention to victims, have them heard, have them be believed, and have their choices respected.
Without putting you on the spot, would you say the civilian prosecution system is focused on having victims heard and understood? Do you think that’s a better place to get victim satisfaction than perhaps in the military courts? Do you have an opinion on that?
Ms. Wilson: Thank you for your kind words, Senator Busson.
You know, of course, the civilian system is not perfect. However, what I can tell you — in almost three decades of policing — is that a victim-centred approach is something we focus on now more than we ever have. One of the things that we talk about with survivors who are going through the court process is that it is not where healing truly starts; it is not where you are necessarily going to have satisfaction or, as I said, healing around what has happened.
However, I can say that we have victim services in place. We have court liaison workers. These days, we all take a trauma-informed approach to working with survivors. Is it perfect? No. Our conviction rates are relatively low; I don’t have the number in front of me, but it is not a perfect system. However, I would say there is a lot of support in the civilian system for survivors these days.
Senator Busson: To elaborate, I was hoping — and making the point with you — that the amount of effort and the extra resources needed to continue that work that gets done by the police at the first instance — and one of our witnesses said that the first time you speak out and make the complaint is the most important. That puts the police right in the middle of it.
Ms. Wilson: The resources required, not just for the investigation but for the victim’s support throughout the process, are extraordinary. This is one of my primary concerns, which is a concern on behalf of the CACP: These are incredibly complex investigations, and they are incredibly expensive. They are very detailed. Just the victim-support piece of it alone is incredibly taxing when it comes to resources.
That is for police who work in collaboration with a number of actors in the justice system to support survivors — and that is everything from the initial reporting and the support that’s required to get a victim to the point where they are providing a statement, all the way through the process, however long that may go. A lot of resources go into that these days, because we do have such a victim-centred approach.
[Translation]
Senator Carignan: My question is for Mr. MacGregor. You were director of prosecutions. In your role with military justice, how many Jordan cases did you witness in cases involving sexual matters?
[English]
Col. MacGregor: Thank you, senator.
I believe it was only one case where we had ended up with a stay in all of the time that I was there. They are not frequent. The benefit of having a smaller prosecution service and a smaller military police service is that we have the ability to ramp up when necessary to get the cases marshalled in before the 18‑month limitation.
Senator Patterson: Thank you. There are a lot of resources that are used within both the military police and the military justice system to ensure it is survivor- and victim-centric. We have done that — the training, the education, et cetera — and this is going to Senator Busson’s point: What is going to happen to all of those resources if they are not being used?
Col. MacGregor: That is another concern. If we continue along this road that we have been going, the Judge Advocate General will be in a situation. He has resources that he has to allot through military justice issues, operational law — all those types of things — and he is going to see the number of cases that we have dwindle to next to nothing. Of course, he is going to take those prosecutors out of that division and move them on to something elsewhere that is more pressing. As time goes on, we are going to lose that expertise.
The police will do the same. If the police are no longer investigating, they will move those police resources over to something else. That’s what they will focus on. There will be a degradation of expertise and being up to speed.
Investigating and prosecuting sexual offences is a very complex area of law, as we all know. If we lose three or four years of being up to date on all of the nuances of the law, then we will be behind considerably and won’t be very professional in terms of being able to deal with these cases if it does come back.
Senator Patterson: And internationally?
Col. MacGregor: Internationally, we are going to continue to investigate and prosecute those, so there is another degradation.
You end up with a two-tiered system. If we continue to go along this line that we are going, we will have prosecutors internationally — and, like I said, with Prime Minister Carney’s remarks about an uptake of military forces, which probably means mobilization and deployments overseas, we are going to have to up our ability to do military justice overseas. The Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their additional Protocols I and II require us to have a disciplinary system that is deployable.
In a sense, we’re probably degrading our capacity to meet those international commitments, which also degrades our discipline, efficiency and morale when we are actually warfighting. We saw that in Somalia. That’s what I am concerned about: We end up back in 1993 with the death of Shidane Arone.
I don’t mean to be alarmist, but those are concerns.
The Chair: This brings us to the end of our time on this panel. Thank you, Colonel MacGregor — the last one standing — and thank you to Dr. MacKenzie and Chief Constable Wilson, who had a hard stop, for taking the time to meet with us. We greatly appreciate your testimonies as we consider this bill. Thank you for the work you have been doing for a long time.
This concludes our agenda for today’s meeting. Tomorrow, we intend to begin clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-11. If you have not done so, members are encouraged to contact the Law Clerk and the Parliamentary Counsel should you wish to bring forth amendments. Also, please share the amendments with the clerk as soon as possible. If you would like your amendments bundled or distributed in advance of the meeting, please share them with the clerk today. Otherwise, please bring copies of your amendments to the meeting.
[Translation]
Senator Carignan: I would like to inform my colleagues that I asked that two amendments be prepared. The first concerns the reintroduction of the option for victims to choose between the civilian and court martial systems. The second amendment is a consequential amendment. It concerns the investigative powers of military police in cases of sexual offences. If the first amendment is adopted, the police must have the power to investigate in cases of sexual offences. This power is currently eliminated in the bill. These are my two proposals.
[English]
The Chair: Thank you for sharing that in advance.
With that, I wish everyone a good afternoon in the Senate.
(The committee adjourned.)