Former Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour, right, and Minister of National Defence, Anita Anand, centre, release the final report of the independent review into sexual misconduct in the military in Ottawa on May 30, 2022. Also in attendance is Chief of the Defence Staff, General Wayne Eyre.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
The Canadian Armed Forces has failed in its attempts to stamp out sexual misconduct and should permanently move all criminal sexual offences to the civilian system, turn over harassment complaints to the human rights commission, appoint an external monitor and consider scrapping Canada’s military colleges, finds a sweeping new report.
The damning report was released Monday and authored by former Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour. It is the third report in seven years to give the government similar recommendations to address sexual assault in the military. All three were written by former justices of the top court. Monday’s report calls for urgent and profound changes to how the Forces operate in order to “create an even and safe playing field for women in the profession of arms.”
One of the dangers of the Forces’ current operating model “is the high likelihood that some of its members are more at risk of harm, on a day-to-day basis, from their comrades than from the enemy,” Ms. Arbour wrote.
Ms. Arbour’s report finds a “disconnect between rhetoric and reality” in what Forces leadership said it would do to end sexual harassment in the military and what has actually happened.
In an April, 2015, report former supreme court justice Marie Deschamps found that women in the Canadian Armed Forces are routinely victims of sexual misconduct including degrading comments, harassment, date rape and inappropriate relationships between people of different ranks. At the time, Canada’s military refused to promise to enact the main recommendation, namely to create a fully independent agency to receive complaints of sexual misconduct.
In response to that report, Ms. Arbour found there was a “flurry of activity” by the Forces in an attempt to fix the problem. “Unfortunately, those efforts have so far failed,” Ms. Arbour wrote.
The latest report from Ms. Arbour was triggered by a sexual assault reckoning in the highest ranks of the military last year. As the former chief of defence staff, then current chief of defence staff (now removed) and other top officers were investigated for harassment or assault, the government tapped Ms. Arbour to study the issue and look at how the Canadian Armed Forces could set up an independent reporting system.
“They need to change how they do many things – and profoundly so,” concludes Ms. Arbour. The “disrepute” that the sexual misconduct crisis has brought onto the armed forces is a “justified condemnation of an archaic and deeply damaging organizational culture.”
Each of the recommendations the 420-page report is inter-related and based on the assumption that others will also be implemented, Ms. Arbour wrote.
“I know that those who live with these issues on a day-to-day basis are eminently capable of determining how best to proceed, if they accept the general direction and changes I am proposing. On the other hand, I am equally convinced that if they do not, no amount of detailed recommendations will produce the desired result,” she said.
On Monday Defence Minister Anita Anand said the government accepts the report in full but has only committed to implementing 17 of the 48 recommendations so far. The rest, she said, will be reviewed by the Forces and the government and if any recommendations are rejected the government will explain why they are not being acted on.
The government will release a final decision on all of the recommendations by the end of the year. Ms. Anand said the government will appoint an external monitor to track the process.
Ms. Arbour’s report recommended the independent monitor produce monthly reports that are made public.
The government will also accept recommendations related to changing the policies for promotion and succession, diversifying the military’s senior ranks, and changes to the military’s sexual misconduct response centre.
“This report will not fall by the wayside,” Ms. Anand said Monday in response to repeated questions about how the government will ensure that this latest report results in change, rather than collecting dust on a shelf.
In the midst of the sexual misconduct crisis that gripped the Forces’ most senior officers last year, former supreme court justice Morris Fish found that sexual misconduct in the military “remains persistent, preoccupying and widespread.” The June, 2021, report said that sexual assault cases should be moved to the civilian military system until sweeping changes were made to overhaul the military justice system and protect victims.
At the time, the government did not immediately act on the recommendations. However, within two weeks of Ms. Anand taking over as Defence Minister last fall, she accepted Mr. Fish’s recommendation, which was repeated in interim recommendations by Ms. Arbour.
In order to ensure the implementation of the recommendations, Ms. Arbour recommends that Defence Minister Anita Anand appoint someone to oversee their progress. That person should produce monthly reports that are made public, Ms. Arbour said.
More to come.
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