NDVA Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON NATIONAL DEFENCE AND VETERANS AFFAIRS

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA DÉFENSE NATIONALE ET DES ANCIENS COMBATTANTS

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, December 11, 1997

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[English]

The Acting Chairman (Mr. David Pratt (Nepean—Carleton, Lib.)): With the indulgence of the committee members, perhaps we could get things rolling. The regular chair and the vice-chair are not available at this time. We expect them soon. They're tied up with other meetings.

If it's okay with the committee, perhaps we could hear from Lieutenant General Leach.

General, perhaps you could start by introducing the people who are with you, and then we'll get right into your testimony.

Lieutenant General W.C. Leach (Chief of Land Staff, Department of National Defence): Thank you. I'm the chief of land staff. With me today are Colonel Dave Read, who is the army's director of personnel, and Chief Warrant Officer Maurice Dessureault, who is the land force command chief warrant officer.

The Acting Chairman (Mr. David Pratt): Would you like to begin your statement?

LGen W.C. Leach: I would.

[Translation]

Mr. Chairman, members of the Committee, it's an honour and a pleasure for me to speak to you today. I do so on behalf of some 40,000 soldiers, regulars and reserves and almost 4,000 civilians who comprise Canada's army today.

[English]

But I also recognize that I am speaking for generations of soldiers who will succeed them, for your work has the potential to have a positive and long-term effect on the institution that I represent.

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The almost 45,000 individuals I've just mentioned are widely spread, but the greatest concentrations are in our three brigade groups headquartered in Edmonton, Petawawa, and Valcartier, each with approximately 5,000 soldiers, in our combat training centre in Gagetown, and in our training, doctrine, and development staffs and units located in Kingston. The 133 militia units complete the army footprint that covers our great country.

I've mentioned the civilians who are part of my command because they are a key part of my garrison support component which allows my soldiers to be deployable.

[Translation]

You've already received excellent and comprehensive briefings on the subject at hand. Therefore, my intent is to give you an army perspective and to confine my remarks to matters of principle, rather than re-visiting or focussing on any particular issues.

[English]

In my view, the essence of your work is responsibilities—those of military personnel to Canada, and those which Canada must accept in return.

In earlier testimony you've been told that service to the Canadian Forces is unique, that its formal responsibilities are spelled out clearly in regulations and that these relate ultimately to “unlimited liability” and “service before self”.

What does this mean in army terms? For soldiers, consenting to serve under this contract confers a life of physical and mental challenge, unconstrained by conventional parameters such as hours worked, results achieved or employment conditions expected. Soldiers' responsibilities are open-ended in regard to operating circumstances, which can and regularly do include 24-hour days or seven-day weeks, extended separation from home and family, and exposure to physical hardship and climatic and environmental extremes. Ultimately it may involve confronting Canada's enemies. All of this occurs at a hands-on personal level which is unique among the three services.

While the changing nature of militaries, weapons and technology may alter the equation somewhat, I believe that in the army, the soldier more so than the equipment will continue to be the critical ingredient in performance.

Soldiers' responsibilities also require them to be ready, not just for the expected, but for the unknown. When the call comes, they're expected to go quickly and, without exception, to be successful, for they're the force of last resort. Failure is not a viable option.

Acknowledging this heavy responsibility, soldiers dedicate themselves to a life of discipline and preparation, preparation which requires them to replicate and master in training on a recurring basis the very worst challenges they may have to confront in operations.

These traditional realities of the soldiers' contract have become yet more complex and demanding in today's world. Canada's interests are truly worldwide and so implicate soldiers routinely. Canadians expect that their army will accurately reflect their ideals and project their best face to the world, and because of the transparency of modern society, they see their soldiers at work in a way they never have before.

If the army's tasks were ever black and white, they are no longer. Today we expect our soldiers to be sensitive, to understand the complexities of our ambiguous world and to make value-based decisions accordingly. The army must act surgically, not as a blunt instrument, and must be adaptable to a multitude of roles. We expect soldiers to prevent wars and to win wars, to build up and to tear down, to liberate and enforce, to be social workers and police, and to be ambassadors for democracy and for Canada.

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New responsibilities also derive from the materials of war and the nature of modern conflict. In every part of our profession soldiers must possess the same advanced technical skills and knowledge which are revolutionizing our world and are in high demand in the marketplace.

Taken together, these many responsibilities, all of which relate to national security in its broadest sense, are of critical importance to Canada. If this is agreed, then you would also agree they deserve to be performed by Canada's best and brightest; and if this is to happen, we must make military service an attractive and rewarding career choice.

What I've described is the theory of soldiering. Let me now describe the practice, using the Lord Strathcona's Horse Royal Canadians, an armoured regiment from 1 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group in Edmonton, as my example.

In the summer of 1996 this regiment was transferred in its entirety from Calgary to Edmonton. Calgary had been home to the unit, its personnel, and families for most of its history. To the extent that soldiers can have roots, the Strathconas were rooted in Calgary.

That fall the unit trained in Wainwright. Then it remained there to be the training support unit which helped prepare and test another unit for a January deployment to Bosnia. Being next in the rotation for Bosnia, the Strathconas formed the nucleus of a 1,200-strong battle group in the new year and they began to prepare themselves for Bosnia. In March of 1997 they deployed to Wainwright for preparatory training.

In April, when the Red River flooded, we tried to isolate them from that operation, but ultimately the need was too great. Within 36 hours of being tasked they had downed tools in Wainwright and deployed 1,000 personnel and hundreds of armoured and wheeled vehicles by road to Winnipeg, where their state of training enabled them to flow seamlessly into the operation. Ten days later, with the crisis passed, the Strathconas were the first unit to leave Winnipeg, returning not home but rather back to Wainwright, to complete their pre-deployment training.

At the end of June, as the school holidays began, the unit began to deploy to Bosnia. There they have performed magnificently, creating a secure environment and nation building. The RSM and I were with them last week. I believe four members of your committee also saw them in Bosnia, and I hope you were as impressed as I was. Thank you for making the effort to go there.

Their redeployment to Canada won't begin until after Christmas and New Year's.

Nor does the story end there. Following disembarkation leave, the Strathconas will reconstitute in their original configuration and begin to train again to develop and maintain the broader range of skills which give them their utility and value. Before the snow is off the ground they will be back in Wainwright and Suffield, training in the war-fighting roles for which they exist. Of course they will always be liable for the unknown, whether it's the blizzards in Victoria or yet another wet spring in Manitoba.

At the risk of putting too fine a point on this example, consider the stresses the soldiers and the families of this unit have experienced in a two-year period: family uprooting, exposure to risk at home and abroad, frequent dislocation, and extended absence from home and family. Doctors tell us these are all peak stress events, which add significantly to the routine stress levels which exist in our society.

Not every soldier experiences this tempo and diversity of activity every year, but for most soldiers in the field army this has become a normal expectation. More to the point, though, every soldier in the army, regardless of where employed, is liable for this type of activity rate, and very few will be heard to complain about it.

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This is all part of the contract that soldiers willingly and knowingly accept on enrolment, and their morale is best when they are gainfully employed in this way. Ironically, they also see operational tours abroad as a satisfier, because they improve their quality of life. Soldiers would be just as busy at home, but when on international operations, they receive very welcome incremental pay and have predictable, uninterrupted periods of leave with their families.

Throughout this description of a soldier's obligations I've used the word soldier generically, making no distinction between regulars and reservists. This is because when we're on operations, the two are indistinguishable and share the same liabilities. For those of you who were in Bosnia, you would not have been able to tell, in talking to soldier X or soldier Y, who was a reservist and who was a regular. You would have had to ask.

Short of volunteering for operations, however, reservists are under no obligation to serve. But their service involves a different kind of commitment, in that part-time soldiers willingly choose to devote up to 60 days a year or more to a profession that is normally a third priority in their lives, behind family and behind their primary job. This is a level of commitment that even full-time soldiers have trouble understanding.

Let me return to the subject of a contract. In consideration of the responsibilities and working environment I have described, I hope you will agree that Canadian taxpayers are getting a great deal for their investment in soldiers. Your task, then, is to determine what kind of deal soldiers should receive in return. As you gather facts, you're going to hear that soldiers are concerned about the state of the contract. The army's assessment, my assessment, as summarized from the bottom up, is that there are five main areas of concern.

First, soldiers want to be compensated fairly for their efforts and sacrifices. Today we are having difficulty maintaining comparability with the public service. You may also wish to consider whether comparability in itself is a valid concept, since soldiering is so fundamentally different from other professions.

Returning to the Strathconas example, let me point out that the tasks they performed in Winnipeg were in many respects identical to those of other emergency services—fire, police, city engineers, etc.—except that the soldiers responded to the full range of tasks. In addition, their hours were longer, their pay significantly lower, there was no overtime, and the soldiers didn't go home at the end of the shift. Nor were they at home before the flood; nor did they return afterwards. In this example it is difficult to find meaningful benchmarks to establish comparability.

Second, soldiers want the tools to do the job. Here, we haven't delivered as we should have. The army, however, will be acquiring new armoured personnel carriers soon, but for now it's still operating with 1960s technology. And despite Canada's climatic extremes we haven't in the past found the money to put our soldiers in state-of-the-art clothing—Gore-Tex being one of the examples you might be aware of, although that technology itself is almost 15 years old. My son has a better winter jacket than my soldiers do. We are now tackling this perennial problem head-on. The clothe-the-soldier project is my number one priority, and we will deliver on it this time.

Third, soldiers want a reasonable work expectation. Today, demand exceeds supply, and we're stretching people to fill the gap, taking advantage of the “can do” attitude and the open-ended contract. Taskings need to be disciplined to a reasonable and sustainable level. Again, we're going to try some things this summer to take the pressure off on some of the taskings.

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Fourth, soldiers, as with any other workforce, want recognition and understanding from their employer. Today the media suggest and polls confirm that many Canadians view their army critically. Contrast this with the fundamentally different culture that exists in other places, especially across the border to our south. American service personnel are viewed as a national asset. They are referred to as “our sons and daughters” or “great Americans”. Support for their sacrifices is almost a national duty, which most citizens are quick to embrace. Do Canadian soldiers deserve less? We should not get what we haven't earned, but thousands have earned better than they have got.

Finally, soldiers are looking for a reasonable quality of life for themselves and their families. I haven't dwelt on families in my remarks, but their role has been emphasized by every other speaker before me. The impacts of the soldier's contract on soldiers can't be separated from impacts on families. Family pressures, in turn, impact directly on soldiers.

We need to recognize the full family commitment required for those who consent to serve and put the necessary support mechanisms in place. Families properly cared for permit a greater degree of operational focus for soldiers who are deployed far away from home.

These legitimate concerns have grown through the 1990s as the nature of soldiering has evolved. Budgets have fallen, and the army, as with many other sectors of society, has attempted to do more with less. From the soldiers' perspective, this has been more with less for less.

[Translation]

The army leadership has been aware of these concerns for several years and has launched several initiatives to address them. I'd be pleased to outline some of these initiatives in the question period.

[English]

In recent years we've also made a point of updating our doctrine to ensure that the nature of our army, to include what we expect of ourselves and what we believe Canada expects of us, is current, as well as accurately, succinctly and vividly expressed, thus creating a common frame of reference for our professional development. This doctrine is articulated in Canadian Forces publication 300, Canada's Army, an advance copy of which has been provided to each of you. The views I have communicated today are entirely consistent with its content.

If I can make a single request, it would be that in the course of your deliberations you view CFP-300 as required reading. CFP-300 describes the army's professional responsibilities and the commitment Canada expects of its soldiers. If doctrine is what is taught—and this document talks about doctrine—and you disagree with anything that's in it, then I sincerely would like to know.

This document will be distributed early in the new year to every—and I underline every—leader in the army. A somewhat condensed version will be available later in the year to every soldier in the army.

I've indicated that the army leadership has made and is making every possible effort to improve the conditions of service and quality of life of our soldiers. We've made progress, but much remains to be done.

While I fully accept my responsibilities for protecting the interests of the army and my accountability for the mixed success achieved, I also recognize that there are limits to what I can do. The reason is that military leaders are bound by the same contracts that motivate our troops. Our first loyalty is to Canada and the role we fulfil in serving the nation. In this context, mission success and the welfare of subordinates are critical responsibilities which are constantly in competition for scarce resources. Though both should be achievable, the ideal is seldom the case. Thus, mission success always comes first and we're often unable to see our soldiers' needs to the extent that we would like.

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This is why the Canadian Forces and the army with me here today are asking Canada to reflect on its responsibilities and obligations to its men and women in uniform. Historically these have existed in an unwritten contract. Today that contract isn't working all that well, and soldiers are constrained, by their ethos of service before self, from speaking out on their own behalf. Perhaps it's time to enunciate a more formal contract with its principles reflected in the department's operating plan.

I'm personally delighted that SCONDVA has undertaken this important work. In my opinion the essence of your challenge, if I can be so presumptuous, is to answer two questions. First, are soldiers more than public servants in uniform? Do they accept special obligations and accordingly have a right to expect special consideration from their country? Second, who is responsible for the soldier's contract? I firmly believe that national defence and the proud institution I represent are too important to be left to generals and admirals alone. By the same token, generals are quite often too implicated in their profession to be able to do their soldiers justice.

Soldiers serve the people of Canada. As you represent Canadians at large and are empowered to speak on their behalf, I urge you to accept this responsibility and give the soldiers' contract the priority it merits.

[Translation]

Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, thank you for your attention. I would be pleased to take your questions.

On behalf of all the members of Canada's army, I wish you happy holidays.

[English]

Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chairman (Mr. Robert Bertrand (Pontiac—Gatineau—Labelle, Lib.)): We now go to question period. We will start with Mr. Hanger who has the floor for 10 minutes.

Mr. Hanger.

[English]

Mr. Art Hanger (Calgary Northeast, Ref.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I would like to thank you, General, and your officers for coming here today and giving this presentation. I was particularly interested in a couple of points in your presentation on which I want to ask you a question. But first I want to make reference to the point of the Bosnia trip, which you stated you just came back from. Several members of our committee were fortunate enough to go over there.

The Bosnia trip was revealing for me, but it was also very disappointing. I'll be quite blunt about that trip and trips like it. It was like a whirlwind. We went through, stopped off here and there, but didn't get any real opportunity to really get down and talk to some of the troops. That's one thing I've heard as far as feedback is concerned about our trip.

In one particular place our helicopter landed, we went in, had a quick dinner and were out. The troops had stood waiting there for two hours for our arrival. We were late getting there and it was unfortunate that all we did was go to the dinner table and then we were whisked out. I don't think that's quite acceptable either.

I can look at it from another point of view. I would be cynical if I were standing there watching a group of politicians come in and go back out. I don't think that's quite acceptable on our part. Unfortunately, our schedule was such that we couldn't change it much. To me those committee meetings should have been forged a little differently, with more casual time. That was my objection to it and that's some of the feedback I heard.

Again, to say we're proud of the Canadian troops—absolutely. The feedback was very clear about what kind of job they were doing there. I am indeed very proud to say that our troops are serving as well as if not better than a lot of other services over there.

LGen W.C. Leach: Could I have 25 words or less to respond to what you just said?

Mr. Art Hanger: Okay.

LGen W.C. Leach: I know exactly what you're talking about. I too get programmed. I have a bit of a reputation for playing with programs as I wish, and from my perspective when I'm in those places there are 24 hours in the day and I've done some weird things and seen troops at weird times.

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My point is that I agree with you 100%. From the perspective of the troops, they don't like it when they get ready to see you and you come and you go, and they don't like it when they expect to see me and I come and I go and I don't have the time. I think what we have to do is to take your point, recognize what you're saying and from both sides, however these things get organized, however they get programmed, make sure things like that don't happen again. It is counterproductive and I will take that point from my perspective.

Mr. Art Hanger: Thank you.

I have one question I must ask first and it relates to a situation the military engaged in some time back. It has to do with the testing of a drug on the troops in two theatres, Somalia being one. It deals with the drug mefloquine. There have been numerous reports about problems associated with the use of this antimalarial drug, including allegations of suicidal tendencies for those who have taken the drug, even some thought—when I think back over to Somalia and some of the information that came out of there—of murder.

Has this matter really been investigated? In fact there was a serious flaw in the study the Canadian military did when it came to the distribution of that drug. What has been done since that time in examining this drug? Is it still being used?

LGen W.C. Leach: This is the first time in my life I've sat in a chair like this and I've attempted to be prepared to answer anything I might be asked here. You've just asked me something I'm totally unprepared to answer as I sit here. I'm aware of some of the generalities of your question, and if it's all right I would like to say that I will undertake to get you the answer to the question, but as I sit here I can't do justice to that question by giving you an answer.

Mr. Art Hanger: I think it's an important issue, given the fact that there has been a lot of controversy swirling around that particular point. I would like to see some written documentation and just exactly the critique made when the military engaged in the so-called study as to how that drug would affect its—

LGen W. C. Leach: I submitted to answer the question in that way because I think it's the most honest way for me to do it.

Mr. Art Hanger: I'm sorry.

LGen W.C. Leach: I'm wondering if the answer I just gave you is acceptable and you will get something back.

Mr. Art Hanger: It is. I expected more from you, but—

The Chairman: You will send your answer to the clerk and the clerk will make sure it's given to all the members of the committee.

Mr. Art Hanger: I think I did expect more from you, given the fact that you're in charge of the army. I thought this would be more of a key point that you might be familiar with, but we'll leave it alone for the time being.

On the aspect of equipment now, you've mentioned that you're going to engage upon a certain course to outfit our troops with some good equipment. I've heard that they've been buying their own clothes and some of their own equipment. I'm curious, if they're going to be out there doing that, how on earth can they afford it when they're already stretched to the limit, especially many of the soldiers who are married, have families and other commitments? I don't see how that should be the case. I believe that this is the case, is it not?

LGen W.C. Leach: I won't deny to you that you saw in Bosnia when you were there, and I saw in Bosnia last week when I was there, soldiers wearing boots they had bought in a hunting goods store before they went there. They are so similar, if not absolutely identical, to the boot that is part of the project coming in that their commanding officers have essentially said if you want to buy it, I'll let you wear it, because we're going to be wearing that within a year or so ourselves. Yes, it is happening. Is it acceptable? It's totally unacceptable.

Mr. Art Hanger: Are they reimbursed?

LGen W.C. Leach: No, they are not being reimbursed.

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If I could come at the question from this perspective, in the past it was deemed that the army didn't really have major capital equipments and that we have traditionally made our procurements in bits and pieces here and there. What has happened is that in taking that approach, we have not been able to address all of the requirements for the army at large. We've picked at it in bits and pieces.

About a year and a half ago it was realized that we were in the predicament we're in and a decision was made to take 24 separate projects, which are called Clothe the Soldier, and bring them together as one package, which we would manage into existence very deliberately. There are three phases to it. We're starting to see the first phase, the first lot of things, coming into existence in 1998. Then the next phases are spread over the next three years, essentially.

It's everything from the underwear they wear, which has to relate to the climate they're serving in—it's thermal if it's in a cold climate and a different kind if they're going to be in a tropical climate—to the combat clothing they wear, the uniforms you saw them wearing, to the parkas, to the boots, to the load carriage equipment they wear. It is every soldier system that the individual soldier carries.

It's going to cost us $140 million or $150 million when you add all of that up. It's going to do something we have not done in the army in this country since about 1964. We are going to be buying about 60,000 sets. This program is geared to 60,000 people. It's geared to every regular soldier, every reserve soldier, and others who are not within my command but who could end up in Bosnia as part of that battle group.

This is going to stop soldiers from buying kit or people turning a blind eye if they do choose to do it and it's going to stop the trading of equipment. If you had gone to Edmonton or seen the soldiers in Edmonton before they left on this particular rotation, you would have seen that they were getting kit that had been worn by previous contingents. Some of it was new and some of it was being traded. We're getting out of that business.

Can it happen just like that? No. Are we determined to make it happen? Yes, we are. It is going on now.

Mr. Art Hanger: Might I finish with just one statement, Mr. Chairman?

I have to leave. I just wanted to let you and your officers know, General, that I have another meeting. It's not that I'm uninterested; I'm very interested and I wish I could stay a little longer. Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Ms. Guay.

Ms. Monique Guay (Laurentides, BQ): General, I am happy to meet you and I took good note of your speech. Right now, we are talking more and more about raising soldiers pay. But considering the current economic conditions and the large number of mistakes made, particularly in Somalia, how can we justify those raises before Canadians and Quebeckers?

You were talking earlier about the American army, saying that its soldiers are looked upon as heroes by the American people. But this is not the case for Canada's army and this might have to do with the present situation.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: I'm going to be a little bit bold in answering your question and say that to start with, I don't know whether or not to be offended by the suggestion that the indiscretions of a few are in some way related to how the group as a whole is to be perceived and is to be taken care of. I hope you don't mean it exactly that way.

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[Translation]

Ms. Monique Guay: This is not my personal belief, general. I was talking about the public's opinion without attacking you personally. It's not an attack against Canada's army. That's the feeling that we have right now and I want to know how you react to that, how the army is reacting to that. It's only a question.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: Fine.

My reaction is a mixed one, because I get mixed signals. I can read the polls. I can read what the papers tell me about how soldiers or in fact anybody in the Canadian Forces are perceived by the public. I don't think I'm naive, but I must tell you that when I go to where the soldiers are, when I go to the communities they live in, when I go to the communities they work in, when I talk to people other than soldiers, I quite readily admit I meet people who don't understand the worth of my profession, but I meet a lot more people who I believe do understand the worth of my profession and do understand the contribution the people in my profession are making.

I think part of this is an effort we have to wage on our own to allow people to know us better. This is not going to be a history lesson, but in days gone by, it is my own personal opinion, we have not been very good ambassadors for ourselves. We have lived in communities and we have put fences around our bases. We have prevented the local community hockey league from coming onto our base and sharing our rink with us. We have run our own United Way appeal, etc.

I guess if I ruled the world and I could make it different, one of the things I would do is make sure everybody in the organization I represent does everything he or she can to let us be known, to let us be appreciated. I really have to tell you I don't believe there are not a lot of people out there who do understand us and support us. As for what I can do about those who don't, I guess I just have to work on them.

[Translation]

Ms. Monique Guay: General, I have been a member of the Canada- United States delegation for five years now and our meetings are always attended by an American general or army personnel who are there specifically to explain the role of the army. Of course, one cannot compare the American army to the Canadian army, but there are always people there to let us know what they do and what goes on exactly in the army. We talked about antipersonnel mines amongst other things. There were army people who were there specifically to express their concerns about antipersonnel mines. Therefore, you might be right when you say that this is lacking in Canada.

My other question has to do with the equipment that you must renew like uniforms, boots, jackets and so on. I know that this is important, but are we giving enough resources to our military people on the social scale? I would like to know what psychological resources are available to them when they are away from home. We know that the distance and long hours of work often account for high levels of alcohol and drug abuse. Are there resources available everywhere where they are on a mission to help them overcome the problems they may face?

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: You are not one of the people who were in Bosnia, are you?

Mrs. Monique Guay: No.

LGen W.C. Leach: What I saw last week in Bosnia surprised even me; and I think I pay attention to my profession. I saw in Bosnia, in some very small locations where there were only, say, 40 or 50 soldiers.... There's not one single place over there right now where a group of soldiers does not have television with VCR, weights—we would have to charter a ship if we were to decide to bring back all of the weight and exercise equipment that is there—arcade machines, video games, and it goes on and on.

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I can remember in my earlier service being in places and those things weren't there. If they were there, it was because the group of soldiers, in one way or another, went out and got one thing from somewhere.

We now have a program in place, and actually I'm quite proud of the kinds of things that they now have available to them in these locations. If there was something they didn't have, I would do everything within my power to make sure that they got that.

I've got to tell you that last week when we were there I don't think anybody approached the RSM or me and identified anything they didn't have that they'd really like more of.

So it's a good question. We're working on it. I think we're making progress.

[Translation]

Ms. Monique Guay: General, you are telling me about material resources. I'm talking about human resources. Do they have resources to help them cope? It's a harsh reality. They see people getting killed. They live through dramatic situations. Are there human resources to help them? Video games don't help solve a psychological problem; they help kill time. I want to know if the soldiers have resources to turn to if they have any problems.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: If I misunderstood, I'm sorry.

With regard to that part of your question, last week I met the padre who is with them. There is a psychologist there. In my previous service we certainly didn't have psychologists in locations like that.

I went into a medical facility last week in Camp Coralici in Bosnia where there is as full a range of medical and psychological and dental equipment—probably better, in fact.... I'll go out on a limb here and say I saw things there last week that are better than probably many of the community hospitals that we have in this country.

One of the things that the medical doctor who was in charge was telling me is that what they do is very early in the tour of the soldiers they all go. They go to the advance surgical centre. They see what is there. They meet the doctors, they meet the psychologists, they meet the padres. They know that help is there and, given that they then know that it's there, they start to call on it as they wish.

My impression is that when we have had problems, there are trauma teams that are made available.... It is recognized that if there is some unfortunate incident, additional resources are committed to it. So I think we're trying to deal with that one as well.

[Translation]

Ms. Monique Guay: I have a very short last comment.

Thank you for your answer, general. I would simply like to add that had those resources been available in the past, we might have avoided situations like the one in Somalia. I do hope that things will get better and that all those resources will definitely be available to all our Canadian soldiers posted abroad.

We know that extraordinary work was done in Haiti by soldiers coming principally from Quebec, because of the language. I do hope that this will continue for our people abroad.

LGen W.C. Leach: Thank you very much.

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[English]

Mr. David Pratt (Nepean—Carleton, Lib.): General, you ended your comments with a couple of questions for us as members of the committee. I know I can't speak for my colleagues on either side of the table here, but from my own perspective I can tell you that in response to the first question about whether soldiers are more than public servants in uniform, my answer is definitely yes.

Second, in terms of who's responsible for the soldier's contract, I believe it is this committee and the House of Commons as a whole, in terms of setting the direction for that contract.

It may seem like a small thing, but my question goes back to your comment—

LGen W.C. Leach: Nothing in my life is small these days.

Some hon. members: Oh, oh.

Mr. David Pratt: I can appreciate that.

My question goes back to the clothing. I guess I'm shocked to find out that we're addressing the issue of better clothing for our armed forces so late. I would have thought that some of this technology in terms of the Gore-Tex and Thinsulate would have been in use for years by the Canadian Armed Forces. I'm very surprised that we're only getting around to dealing with this now. I would be interested in knowing when you expect to complete this project in terms of ensuring that our armed forces do get the proper clothing for whatever climatic conditions they're required to serve in.

I would also be interested in knowing the level of research that goes into designing some of this clothing, because a soldier's requirements are clearly lot different from a skier's requirements. And to ensure that they have the best clothing possible, it would seem to me, at least, that you don't necessarily try to buy off the shelf. Some thought has to be given to this in terms of ensuring that the soldier who's wearing the clothing has the necessary freedom of movement and the necessary warmth to be able to concentrate on the job he or she is doing rather than concentrating on how he or she is going to get warmer.

LGen W.C. Leach: I wish Mr. Hanger were here to hear how I'm going to answer your question, but I trust that you will tell him what I've said in his absence.

I would like to pick up on your last point first, because what bothers me when I see the soldier wearing the pair of boots that he bought with his own money is not, I think, what Mr. Hanger is most bothered about. He may be more bothered by the fact that the soldier spent the $240 to buy himself a pair of boots. And that's bad enough, but what bothers me is your very point.

A soldier in an operational situation is not like my son walking out with this absolutely wonderful jacket that my good wife bought him while I was in Bosnia. When my son puts that on in the morning to go to Carleton University and stands at the bus stop, that's really what that jacket is meant to do for him.

What I want on my soldiers in Bosnia or on Ellesmere Island or on the outskirts of Edmonton in the middle of a winter storm is not necessarily the same thing. To buy off the shelf.... In some ways that may make it sound terribly easy, but in many ways it may be a terribly irresponsible thing for us to do.

So when I say that we have made a commitment, and when I sort of hammer my fists down and say damn it, they can trust us because it's going to happen, I mean it. But implicit in making it happen is not just sending somebody with a truck and a bag of cash downtown and buying every Sun Ice jacket available. It's making sure that we are buying the right stuff.

Off the top of my head, we deal with that in three ways. First, we always try to make sure we know what our allies are doing. Having said that, I'll also make another pronouncement. In all the travelling I've done in 38 years of military service, I've seen that nobody can knock a Canadian harder than a Canadian can knock a Canadian. We don't give ourselves credit for half the things we do, which is probably some of the best stuff in the world. We have a research and development capability within the Department of National Defence and some research and development establishments spread across the country that have done world-class research in these areas.

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In the city of Toronto, beside the old Downsview airport, there is a facility called the Defence and Civil Institute of Environmental Medicine. If you were to go there you would see, I say again, a world-class capability at looking into these very things, world class to the point that some of our allies are actually wanting to come to our test facilities and talk to our people who are doing research in these areas.

So I can assure you that part of making this happen is not just coming up with the dollars. That we can make happen. It's bringing together the dollars; it's bringing together the responsible research that has to be done; it's bringing together a very clear understanding in our own minds of exactly what we want and need. It's bringing all of those things together to produce the right boot, the right parka, whatever.

So that's coming at your question from back to front, but when you say you're astounded at the situation that exists, we're all smarter after the fact and we have smartened up on this particular issue in the last few years.

On the delivery schedule, some of the items have already started to come into service, and I think the program is to run until about the year 2000.

Mr. David Pratt: That's fully equipping....

LGen W.C. Leach: In terms of all of the items.

What I could do, and I will do and I will send back to the clerk so there are no misconceptions here.... I don't mean that in 1998 the soldier is going to get a boot, but the glove that is compatible with it isn't going to come until 2001. What we're trying to do is to deal with the right packages of things in the same timeframe. The combat clothing, which is the uniform that covers you from the hat you wear on your head to the boot on your foot, is probably going to come in about the same timeframe, all of that.

The load-carrying vest, or a new flak jacket, or the next generation of helmet, that may come later, but it replaces something we already have that is pretty good. So we've tried to phase these things in intelligently so they end up being properly clothed all the way along the line. It's not an easy thing to deal with, but we'll make it happen.

Mr. David Pratt: I have another couple of questions along this line.

I'm pleased to hear about the research that's being done. One of the things I think we have to think more of as well when we develop technology like this that could be of use in other countries—and I'm thinking of other northern countries, the Russians, the Swedes, the Norwegians, the Finns—is once we get these products fully developed, are there any export opportunities there, based on perhaps information that you've gathered from other armies in terms of whether or not we can sell Canadian products like that to our allies.

LGen W.C. Leach: I've been accused for my whole career of straying onto other people's turf, and this is very definitely somebody else's turf, but the answer is yes.

The research and development community that exists, the industrial community that is linked with that, is part of a.... If you think of the NATO alliance, all of these people are exchanging information on a regular basis, they're sharing research, and so on. As to how that gets translated into industrial opportunities for Canadian industry, there are opportunities there. I'm already aware of some instances where they have been able to capitalize on it.

Mr. David Pratt: Would you say the department has this in mind in terms of a future projection?

LGen W.C. Leach: This is really outside my mandate, but I'm not sure that it's within the realm of the mandate of the Department of National Defence to do what Industry Canada and others are mandated to do. In fact we have rules that suggest to us that we shouldn't be in competition in things like this.

So what we try to do is to make sure to the best of our ability that Industry Canada and other interested parties, industry itself, is a part of the process, because in some of the research there are.... I'm not even sure what the right word is, but there are legal protections for the research that is done that then has to be legally protected. Some of those things do get shared and they get sold back and forth. I know that.

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Other people are working on it. I'm looking for the output of all of this for the soldiers who are my responsibility. I think the work that's being done does have benefits for Canada and Canadian industry and it is being shared.

Mr. David Pratt: I have just one final comment. I think, especially on the issue of clothing, it's extremely important and it's a major strategic consideration for us as well. When I think of the old footage I've seen of the Americans, for instance, fighting in the Second World War at Bastogne or the Russians fighting the Finns in 1941 or the German retreat from Moscow, clothing was a very important part of each one of those operations.

LGen W.C. Leach: You don't look that old.

Mr. David Pratt: Sorry?

LGen W.C. Leach: Oh, these are films you're talking about.

Mr. David Pratt: Yes, old newsreels.

The Chairman: Now we go to the five-minute questions. Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit (Lakeland, Ref.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good morning, General Leach and gentlemen. Thank you for coming this morning.

In your brief on page 9 you have a little section that I think is so important. You say:

American service personnel are viewed as a national asset. They're referred to as “our sons and daughters” or “great Americans”, and support for their sacrifices is a national duty that most citizens are quick to embrace. Do Canadian soldiers deserve less?

I think that is such an important statement, and I thank you for putting that in your brief.

I do think Canadian soldiers aren't viewed the same way American soldiers are and I think that's very unfortunate. I think politicians more than anyone else should take the blame for that happening over the past 30 years, because quite frankly they've given an indication to the general public that it's not important to have a strong, combat-ready army to protect us and to deal with other emergencies that come up within and outside the country. I think the leadership in the military in the past is somewhat to blame as well. We've seen particular instances where they should share a lot of the blame.

I'd like to just ask you from that how you view the morale of the Canadian military right now. Perhaps you can keep your answers very short because I do have an awful lot of questions I'd like to ask. I'll ask them in a very concise, short way from now on.

LGen W.C. Leach: How you measure morale depends on where you go to measure it. I was in a place last week in Bosnia where there are 1,200 soldiers, and I have to tell you they are higher than a kite. They're higher than a kite because they have a mission, they have a focus, they know what they're doing, they know a lot of people are depending on them, they know they're doing things that the Americans, the British, and the French are looking at and saying look at how the Canadians are handling their sector. They're reasonably comfortable that we're taking care of them personally while they're there and that we're taking care of their families back home. They have a mission, they have a focus, their morale is good, and they know they're doing a good job.

If you want to measure the morale by asking somebody in a static location who is more oriented to what they see in the press on any particular day or what they hear on the bus ride in the morning, you'll get a different measure of morale. That's just the way it is. Come with me to 101 Colonel By Drive and measure morale there and you'd get one indication. Go to Bosnia with me and you'd get a completely different one.

My impression has to be geared to what the morale is in the operational environment among the troops who are performing the operations. I may be wrong, but I think it's pretty good. I also think they have some questions and concerns, some of which I've outlined here, and if they know we're working on those, then I think they're okay.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I couldn't agree more that if our troops know they're doing something very useful and that they're appreciated, of course morale will be good. That's probably the key issue affecting morale, but there's also pay. I just want to ask you if you believe the recent pay increases that have been announced will give any sense of relief to our troops and will help with morale.

LGen W.C. Leach: This is a question to which there may not be a short answer, but I'll try.

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One of the big things people like me have to do is...I have to be responsible downward, and I have to be responsible upward. What I have to do is to make sure the soldiers who are getting these raises understand and keep in mind the predicament of the country, the state of the economy in the country, the level of unemployment, the number of young children or young adults, recent graduates from school, who are without jobs to their liking or aren't getting what they think they deserve.

That having been said, the soldiers, I believe—and I made reference to it in connection with the comparability issue—know that all public servants in this country have for the last number of years been subjected to a pay freeze. That they know. They also know that before that freeze came into place this comparability issue, this equation that has been there for about the last 30 years...things were out of balance for them, and they were behind.

I think their basic question might be this. If comparability is something we signed up to, if comparability is something the government of this country...and it's part of the operating procedures of how we compensate people in the military, if that is the way it's supposed to be, then why were we behind to start with? If it's a rule, it's a rule. We should have been even when the whole process started, but we weren't, so you have to make good to us on that. Then I think what they expect is that they will get no less than what other raises in the public sector are, again with the comparability factor added on.

That is the fair expectation, I think. But so far what they have seen is the best we've been able to do in coming out of the pay freeze period, in trying to address the comparability lag, in trying to address the pay adjustment lag at a time when the negotiations with the public service unions are not yet complete.

Probably if I had to sum it up I would say a large measure of what is going on now is related to how we explain and how well we allow people to understand where we are and where we're going. When I get asked questions like that by the soldiers themselves, as I did last week, they get it all, in terms of where we are and where we aren't.

So I think it would be unreasonable and irresponsible to say give somebody X and they will do anything you want. That's not it. It's the issue of predictability and fairness.

Mr. Leon Benoit: General Leach, that's a good point—fairness. I believe the defence minister was quoted as saying in committee—he was quoting General Douglas MacArthur—morale will quickly wither and die if soldiers come to believe themselves the victims of indifference or injustice on the part of their government.

You're talking about fairness. We have the troops who are receiving, maybe, a 0.6% increase, 1.4% for the year, when they were promised 3%, yet we have the leaders, yourself included, who are getting at least a $4,000 performance bonus. Whether it's deserved or not isn't the issue here, but they are getting at least a $4,000 performance bonus. Do you think our troops can possibly see the fairness in that, and what do you think that does for morale?

LGen W.C. Leach: I'm going to take some great liberties here and I'll tell you how I answered that question with a series of very junior soldiers in Bosnia last week.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'll bet it's being asked. I'll bet a lot of people in the service are asking that question.

LGen W.C. Leach: You don't have to bet, because I'll tell you. I was asked that question.

The answer I gave them was that every one of us, including myself, is relative to somebody else in the pecking order of life and the compensation equation.

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One of the favours I think we may not have done ourselves is that past a certain rank, pay is unknown to others. I told the corporals how much I make because I'd rather have me telling them that I make $109,600 than I would to have them read in the paper that I make $132,000, that I have a car and driver, and that I have all sorts of other benefits. I told them exactly what I make, and I told them what I don't get.

I also told them to think about it, and to come tell me if this bothered them. They thought about it, and nobody came back to tell me. I said that if I am their commander and I'm responsible for 45,000 people and have the legal and other obligations that I have, they should tell me how fair it is at my level that there are 66 people working for the Workers' Compensation Board in the province of Ontario who make much more than I do; that there are 2,000 people working in the universities in the province of Ontario who make more than I do. Everything is relative. When it was explained to soldiers in that regard, they realized that they are all on this floating equation.

Mr. Leon Benoit: General, I don't think that argument would mean an awful lot to the men and women in our forces when they're getting—

LGen W.C. Leach: No, but I'm giving it to the men and women—

Mr. Leon Benoit: —a pay increase of 10¢ a day if they're privates, a pay increase of 25¢ a day if they're corporals, and you're getting a $4,000-plus bonus. I just don't think that can possibly be good for morale.

The Chairman: That's it?

Mr. Proud.

Mr. George Proud (Hillsborough, Lib.): I'm just going to continue on that roll Mr. Benoit was on. I want to go back to this chapter at the top of page 9 regarding this business of comparing our people to the Americans, that they're “great Americans”, they're “sons and daughters”. I agree with that, and I'm going to ask you two questions.

First, how do we get that message out? I agree with what Leon said. Over the years, I think governments have done a job of not getting the message out that our military is a very important part of our community. We sat around this table and others like it in 1994, and we did a review of the defence policy. Every time we'd mention increasing anything, people from every party would ask how we were going to sell it to the public.

My argument was, and always is, that it's not hard to sell to the public. The problem is to sell it to the treasury benches, and that doesn't matter what party is in power. That's always been the problem, and when you get the people who are against the military—and they're a pretty vocal voice—the first thing that's cut in any round of cuts is the military and other organizations. That's the problem we're facing. I'd love to see our people have the respect that these people south of the border do. I'd like you and others to tell us in this committee how we get that word out, because I believe it's very necessary. That's one question.

The other question is on the clothing and other things that we've we talked about. I've sat in this committee now for going on eight years. I've heard this go around and around many times. I was in Bosnia in 1994, and there were problems with equipment then. So I ask you this question: If the jackets and stuff are so important, and I have no doubt that they are, with the money that the Department of National Defence had—and I know their budget was cut dramatically in my time around here—could money not have been found and used and diverted from other things to make these things a reality?

One of the things we got into in the defence review was off-the-shelf buying. I think you'll have to agree that with the way things were done over the years, if you paid—I'm just using any kind of a figure—$1,000 for it off the shelf and then took it through the regular channels that it goes through, it would cost you $20,000. I think that's the problem we've had over the last 50 years—or more than that, probably the last 75 years. Somewhere in between, I think there has to be a place where these things can become reality. So I believe there are things we can buy off the shelf. I believe in research and development, because we have to do that and we set standards by that. There are things we can do, but I certainly think there are a lot more things we can buy off the shelf than we have been buying.

I put that to you. You only have a short period of time to come back on it, but I'll give you that much and leave the pay and all that for some time at the end.

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LGen W.C. Leach: On the issue of what we did with the money in the past, we did what we did. It was done by whoever made the decisions at the time, based on the issues and priorities of the time. To go back and second-guess doesn't achieve anything, least of all get the boots they still don't have.

The only way I can think of to deal with the issue is to say “Okay, I didn't choose to serve. I happen to be serving now.” The way I look at the priorities, they're pretty straightforward. If I don't have to buy a glitzy piece of kit X, leave it for the next cycle, but make sure I get the clothing now. I have made the commitment, and clothing is the issue of the day; that's my priority. Five years from now somebody else will be sitting here and they can then be faulted for not buying a truck and spending money stupidly on clothing. I will go with my decision on the clothing. So I can't look back in that regard.

Mr. David Pratt: I'm not asking you to look back, but don't you think it can be done?

LGen W.C. Leach: Of course it can. And the second part of your question has to do with off-the-shelf. Don't let me mislead you. Everything is not going to be invented from the ground up. Some of the 24 projects that are under way are essentially off-the-shelf. You don't need a lot of rocket science to figure out what kind of basic knife a soldier needs, and they are out there.

On the question of what kind of jacket a soldier needs in cold weather climates on the battlefield, it has to have certain protections for that soldier in terms of visibility, in terms of shielding him from the equipment others have that can see through the dark of night with light intensification or infrared equipment. It has to have some built-in capability for him to survive on the battlefield, given all of the other things that are out there.

The difference between the wonderful jacket my wife bought my son and what I hope to put on the soldier is that the jacket on the soldier is not just going to keep him warm at the bus stop or on the battlefield; it's going to protect him from some of the weaponry and equipment the other people have. It will also be designed so when he puts his flak jacket over it, puts the helmet on his head and puts his earphones on, because he has to operate the radio while he's wearing his helmet, those things will go together.

Where research is needed to meet the operational requirements, we do the research to make sure we get the right item. Again, I'm not a technical person, but I can tell you the boot they sell in the hunting store in west-end Ottawa that you might wear this weekend to go out and shoot ducks is not the boot the soldiers will need if they're going to be wearing that boot 18 hours a day and walking a long distance in it, etc. The boot for the soldier has to have more ankle support and it has to have some ballistic protection built into the sole so he's protected if he steps on nails or walks through glass or something. Those are the things we're trying to deal with.

Yes, we buy off the shelf if it can be adapted very quickly to meet our requirements. Everything doesn't get built from the ground up.

Mr. David Pratt: Would those boots not already be available in the south, in America? Would they have to be different, basically, except for the cold?

LGen W.C. Leach: We already have equipment we have bought from other people, but there aren't a lot of other countries in the world that operate in the climatic conditions that exist in this country of ours and have commitments to send their troops to some of the places we do. Where they have equipment, we look at it. If it meets our needs, we consider it. We don't buy something from them just because it exists if it doesn't meet our requirements.

Mr. David Pratt: On the business of the PR, what do you think? Do you have any comments on that?

LGen W.C. Leach: Could I be really bold and out of line here and say I can't figure out how the hell I, as the chief of land staff in Canada, would have a greater opportunity than somebody like you to move agencies of government. I don't think it's within our culture that people like me do things like that. I think it's within our process that people other than me do it.

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Mr. George Proud: As Madame Guay said before, one of the things you see with the Americans is that their chiefs of defence staff, for instance, usually on a weekly basis, do a press conference and things like this.

LGen W.C. Leach: Yes.

Mr. George Proud: I don't know whether that helps or not.

LGen W.C. Leach: It does.

Mr. George Proud: They certainly have a lot more affection down there than we do up here.

LGen W.C. Leach: Well, there's a cultural difference here too, and it's a little bit unfair of me to make the point I did without recognizing that the cultures are different.

But I think we already, as part of the follow-up to the minister's report from last spring, have a commitment for the Chief of the Defence Staff to periodically appear and offer a report. I'm not sure if that's something that has been done in Canada before, but I think we're about to start doing it.

Mr. John Richardson (Perth—Middlesex, Lib.): General Leach, thank you very much for appearing before us.

I can remember that when I was a soldier people used to line up at the local—it was the First World War, George was saying—to buy surplus military clothing to protect them, to go out to hunt, whatever it was, boots, mouton jackets, pieces of sweaters, wool socks. They were ahead of the civilian products at the time.

The big move came in 1962, when they threw out the ammunition boot and they bought the high boots. It was more comfortable for our soldiers and it made them look a lot smarter.

Napoleon used to say—and I probably have him misquoted—give me miles of colourful ribbon and bright uniforms and I'll have soldiers follow me anywhere. I think dress in the forces is very important, but when we talk dress first we have to talk operational dress, to save their lives and make them combat ready and prepared to fight and win.

Maybe we've let you down. I think you've also let yourselves down by not pressing this harder. It is a big morale factor for a soldier to look smart, whether it's a female or a male soldier.

The presentation on the streets we see of our soldiers.... The navy wear their whites and blues and the air force have their light blues and the army wear their tans.

One of the problems with the tan uniform—and I'll say this, you've probably all had the same—is that if you're not a model of Mr. Universe, you sure look like Humpty Dumpty. It's because the damned thing doesn't have a pleat in it to make it dress better and drop down better. The jacket's nice, but the pants and shirt.... To put it bluntly, if you're not the right shape, you can look like hell.

I would certainly go a long way to try to see that we get the dress so they do look smart and a slight imperfection in their bodies doesn't show up all over the place.

Please press forward with your program on dress. My priority would be to get the combat dress up to the standard you want and in the quantity that you want. Take a good look at the walk-out dress as well.

LGen W.C. Leach: Do I have an opportunity to—

An hon. member: Sure.

The Chairman: And comment on the uniform.

LGen W.C. Leach: I have every intention to comment on the uniform.

You might notice that my body is shaped the way it is. It's not long and thin; it's a little bit shorter and a little bit broader, and I've been in some of those situations myself.

However, if I want to go back a couple of years and look at what our soldiers said about uniforms, our soldiers said quit screwing us around, we don't need a lot of different uniforms, we just need the basic uniforms and let's make some decisions and get on with life. The soldiers said there are two uniforms that are important if you're a soldier, and one is combat clothing; get it for us, get the right amount, get the right type, because when we're on the battlefield we want to feel comfortable operationally, comfortable personally, and then morale will be okay. We're addressing that.

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The second issue from the soldiers is why is it that we have this green uniform, which is technically called rifle green and which the soldiers like, and the tan uniform, which you described quite well—I would probably be a little ruder and cruder—what people look like in it. So we made a decision. I've made a decision. I've been led to believe by the Chief of the Defence Staff that he agrees with my decision and would be making it happen. The army is going to give the soldiers what they want. There are going to be two uniforms in the army in the future, and they're going to be combat and this uniform, the green. We are going to stop swapping back and forth. We are going to stop wearing a uniform in the summer that doesn't breathe and makes you like a bag of you know what and is just all-round uncomfortable.

I don't know, I may have pre-empted the opportunities of the minister to say yes or no. But the fact is the soldiers said all these other things are important, but you are absolutely right, dress is critical; why don't you make some decisions and get on with life. We've made them. It's happening. I would expect that as early as this summer you probably aren't going to see people walking around in tan uniforms the way they have in the past. When you tell the soldiers in Bosnia, and they say what are you doing about my dress, and we tell them, even though it's not public yet, they say thank you.

Mr. John Richardson: Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I think Mr. Proud asked a good question about what has happened to the money in the past. Why have such things as basic equipment, basic personal uniforms and equipment, not been properly taken care of with the amount of money that was there? Reform in 1993, in our plan to balance the budget in three years, did call for a reduction in military spending from $12.5 billion a year down to $11 billion a year. We thought you just can't go lower than that. Now we find that we'll be down to $9 billion a year in total military spending. It's gone too low. There are too many problems caused by reducing to that level.

I don't think money is the whole problem. We don't really know whether the money is being spent well or not. We need more openness. The general Canadian public, and certainly this committee and others, need more information and openness to really know and for us to be able to try to decide whether the money is being well spent.

I'd like to ask you, General, whether you are completely committed to the openness and transparency that the Minister of Defence and the Chief of Defence Staff have promised will be there in the military from now on. I'd like a short answer if possible, as I have several questions.

LGen W.C. Leach: This is probably totally inappropriate of me, but you asked me questions that have long answers and then tell me to give you a short answer.

The bottom line is I will give you two things to indicate where we're going. Ten years ago within the department it was not normal to tell other parts of the same organization what the budgetary allocation for each of them was so that everybody knew what everybody else was getting. We actually told you what your budget was but we wouldn't tell this fine lady what her budget was because we thought you might beat us up on it.

The reverse has happened. I got myself in a little bit of trouble not too long ago by explaining to the world how I was going to deal with an issue of $134.4 million in fiscal year 1998-99 and telling people exactly where I was going to take it from and where the impact would fall. The only way we can do business from a corporate sense is to first know our own business well enough and know what we're spending and where we're spending it, and to know across the piece, because all of these things come together.

Sir, I'm not sure where you're from, but if there's a Canadian Forces facility near you—

Mr. Leon Benoit: Cold Lake and Wainwright.

LGen W.C. Leach: In those areas, despite the fact Wainwright is within my budgetary responsibility and Cold Lake is within the budgetary responsibility of the commander of air command, there are two.... In those two locations, each of us has responsibilities for cadets, or we have responsibility for militia, or we have responsibility naval reserve, or whatever.

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The only way we're going to survive and get ourselves out of this thing is visibility. I can tell you that within the army, I had a meeting yesterday afternoon, and every one of my area commanders, every one of my subordinate commanders, has a funding model for the command for which I'm responsible, which has everything in it. It's not a classified document. I'll put it on the bus tonight, if you want.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'd appreciate that.

You are committed to openness, you've said. At the defence committee on October 28, 1997, Mr. Eggleton, the defence minister, said that the military had done research to try to find out whether the members of the forces are using food banks. He told reporters afterwards, and this is a quote, “We haven't been able to come up with any specific cases, or many cases.”

General, if you could, I'd like you to tell me why the minister wouldn't know about cases of troops and their families going to food banks. In fact, Mr. Hanger knows of several dozen such cases of families from Gagetown. Just yesterday, with a single phone call, we found out that there are thirteen families in Winnipeg who are relying on food banks to supplement their income and their food. Those are just the ones who are using the military family resource centre. Several others are going to food banks off the base as a way of supplementing their income for food.

My question is, did you advise the minister that personnel under your command were using and depending on the food bank to supplement their incomes? I mean, on the one hand he said that the research has been done and he hasn't found any, but we found several dozen just like that, and we're not hearing about all of them, I'm certain.

LGen W.C. Leach: What can I say?

Mr. Leon Benoit: Well, did you—

LGen W.C. Leach: No.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Specifically, the question is did you advise the minister that in fact there were a good number of families who were relying on food banks?

LGen W.C. Leach: Did I advise the minister? No, I didn't advise the minister. Was I paying attention to the fact that people were, and I knew who they were? I guess I have to say no. Am I concerned about that? Yes. Is it part of the total issue we're trying to deal with? Yes. But if your question is did I specifically give the minister information, no, I didn't specifically give the minister information.

Mr. Leon Benoit: There's an incredible contradiction here. The minister said the research had been done and he had heard of no cases, or.... The exact quote, again, was “We haven't been able to come up with any specific cases, or many cases.” That's his quote.

Don't you see that there's a problem there—this promise of openness in the forces? The minister says there has been a study done. I would assume you would be aware of that study. Yet he has heard of none or few who are relying on the food banks. There's an incredible contradiction there. If there isn't better communication between the people like yourself and the minister, I don't see things getting better, quite frankly.

The Chairman: Your time is up, Mr. Benoit.

LGen W.C. Leach: I'm trying to figure out what to say here so that you don't go away thinking that I don't care, because I do care.

Can I ask you one question? And I'm not trying to play word games with you here. You quoted the minister, and you said two different things. You quoted him as saying there weren't any, and also that there weren't many. What did he say?

Mr. Leon Benoit: That was his quote—“We haven't been able to come up with any specific cases, or many cases.”

LGen W.C. Leach: But they're two different things, aren't they?

Mr. Leon Benoit: Well, that was his quote.

LGen W.C. Leach: There are some—

Mr. Leon Benoit: The consummate politician, then, I would suggest.

LGen W.C. Leach: It's not fair for me to comment on that, I don't think.

The Chairman: Thank you, Mr. Benoit.

[Translation]

Ms. Girard-Bujold.

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold (Jonquière, BQ): Good afternoon, general. I'm very happy to be here. It's my first time at this committee.

• 1310

In your presentation, you said that there are five main areas of concern. I will dwell upon the third and the fourth ones. You say that soldiers want a reasonable work expectation. You also say that you take advantage of the “can do” attitude and of the open- ended contract of military personnel.

What do you mean by that? What proportion does the “can do” attitude represent? Do soldiers have some autonomy within their workload or is it really strict?

You also say that soldiers, like any other workforce, want recognition from their employer. We're talking here about human relations. Do such relations exist in the Canadian Armed Forces? That is the soldiers' fourth area of concern.

Finally, you say that soldiers are looking for a reasonable quality of life for themselves and their families. What do you mean by reasonable? What does it mean for you? Like my colleague from the Reform Party just said, are they not paid enough, do they need food banks? What does the word reasonable refer to?

You also said earlier that you went to meet people to let them know that you agree that everybody should know what the salary is at every level of the hierarchy. As well, you are in favour of pay raises that, according to you, would meet the expectations of the soldiers and their families. Thank you.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: I'm having difficulty figuring out exactly what the questions are. Can you help me with—

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: I took your text where you say, third, that soldiers want a reasonable work expectation. What does reasonable expectation mean? Is the autonomy that soldiers need to do their work included in this reasonable expectation? You also talk about a “can do” attitude. Could you be more specific?

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: Okay, I'm clear on your question.

That third point is probably more for me and people like me to do something about than it is for people like you; and I believe we are doing something about it. I can tell you that in days gone by, when the RSM and I were much younger and much more junior, our bosses did not think it was a difficulty if the unit going out on an exercise left at 6 a.m. on a Monday, which meant the soldiers had to come in on Sunday night or work through the weekend to get ready to go out on the exercise. Our bosses didn't think there was any problem with finishing training or letting people go at 7 p.m. on a Friday, which would cause them, again, to cut into what I think you or somebody else would see as “I need some private time, I need some family time”.

We used to send people on taskings—that's when we decide somewhere within our system that we're going to run a course in Chilliwack or Gagetown or somewhere—and on very short notice we would just tell people to get ready and go. I think in the last few years we have realized that in taking care of your people you really do have to take care of your people and not treat other people in a way you would be upset with.

• 1315

Within the army now, I don't think you'll find people organizing training who require people to come in on the weekend to get ready to go on Monday morning. They'll probably go on Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning, and we'll give them the time. You don't see people being tasked to do things unreasonably.

We have to keep reminding ourselves of that. Soldiers, basically, will do what you tell them. They'll go and do it. That's the “can do” attitude.

The reasonable work expectation is for us to decide what it is we want those people to do and how we're going to manage their activities. That's the way we're dealing with it. But you have to be aware of that, because when you talk about the quality of life overall, you'll hear people talk about this.

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: You say that there are fewer and fewer soldiers but that the tasks still need doing. I read your brief quickly, and you say that you reflect the main concerns of military personnel. Therefore, it is really the quality of life that suffers in the Armed Forces?

You say that you will deal with all of that, but I think that we have to act more quickly because morale is very important. However, the morale of the Canadian Armed Forces is quite low right now. I am mainly talking about the soldiers because it might not be the case for the hierarchy which you are part of. I think that the soldiers who represent Canada right now and who often live through difficult times must be taken into consideration.

You're a Lieutenant General yourself, but I'm talking about the private soldiers. Also, if you want our soldiers to be on the same level as the Americans, you would compensate them in recognition of the difficulty of their tasks. You're talking about boots and equipment, but to me it's not the most important thing. It seems to me that pay and job satisfaction are much more important.

I think that it is where the problem lies. Soldiers are not paid well enough for the job they perform. That's the conclusion I have come to.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: In responding to that, I would say that the soldiers are watching us. We have already indicated to them that we recognize we have to do things differently today and tomorrow than what we used to do. I told you that we already put some measures in place to ensure we don't assume they're just going to come when we call them at stupid times to do stupid things. They know we made some changes, and they're watching us.

For instance, the units going to Bosnia in the summer of 1998 have already been told, so they're mentally preparing themselves. They know what their commitments are. That's assuming we're in Bosnia, okay?

Say Canada makes a commitment to be in Bosnia past the summer of 1998. I already told the unit it would have to go, because I can't wait. I must be fair with them. I must say that if somebody has to go in the summer of 1998, I'm telling you who it is now.

They like that. This is a predictability they didn't have in the past. I guess what I'm saying is that we have to continue to do that.

The question of pay versus equipment versus boots is the challenge. It's the challenge for you in your home and me in my home. It's the challenge for me in trying to take care of the army to know what the right balance is in all of these things.

I would tell you—you may not want to believe this—that if the soldiers I met in Bosnia last week knew we were concentrating on one part of that equation, not all parts of the equation, they would not be happy.

• 1320

Pay is an issue, yes. So are the boots on their feet. So is the truck they drive. They are trusting people like me and others to make the right decisions about the whole equation, and not just one part of it. That is the challenge.

[Translation]

The Chairman: Thank you very much, madam. If you will allow me, general, I would also have some questions to ask you.

I was a bit late for your speech, but I was able to read it quickly. I've noticed that you did not allude in your presentation to the role of women in the army. Was is on purpose? Is it because for you there is no difference between a man and a woman soldier? This is my first question.

[English]

My second question is on the clothe-the-soldier program. You said it would end around the year 2000, if I understood you right. Why isn't it an ongoing process? Why do we have to end it in the year 2000? Why is it not whatever comes out on the market that is good for our soldiers, we get it?

LGen W.C. Leach: Your first question was...?

The Chairman: It was on the role of women in the army.

LGen W.C. Leach: If there's anybody, maybe other than the CDS himself, who has been questioned on this issue it's probably me. In fact I have written some things that have caused me to be questioned from outside the army and from inside the army. It goes without question from me that there is no occupation in the army that is closed to women. There is only one occupation in the whole of the Canadian Forces that is closed to women, and that's duty on submarines. There is no occupation in the army. Therefore there is no reason why there are not going to be women in the army.

There are a lot of women in the army. There are not a lot of women in the combat arms within the army, and we have taken measures, starting this summer, to attempt to see.... Because everything that we do, all of the women we talk to both within the military and outside the military say they want an opportunity to serve. They think they're entitled to an opportunity to serve, and they have it.

There are two issues that I think have to be laid on the table. Number one, the business we're in is such that life and death could be an issue. Therefore we have to have a standard. There's only one standard, and the people who meet it can come in, be they men or women. We have women who fail the standard, and also men. This is the thing we always forget about. It's assumed that any man who walks in can meet the standard. Wrong. There are men who can't meet the standard. If they don't meet the standard, they don't get into the army. Women who meet the standard get the opportunity.

The second issue is one of do we make them welcome. Who in their right mind would join an organization for a long time if they didn't think that we wanted them?

So there are two issues here, I think. One is to make sure that everybody is aware that there is no occupation in the army a woman cannot be part of, and that anybody who meets the standard and gets through the system is welcome in the army.

The second part of it is the more difficult issue because it's a cultural thing that has developed over the years that we have to make people aware of, and that's that we welcome you. Within the army, if you meet the standard, we will not do things to make you feel unwelcome.

The interesting thing is that if you go to any school in any one of the ridings you represent you will see young men and young women who are going through the school system today who do things together. They play on hockey teams together. They play on water polo teams together. They go to school together. They grow up together. So it's very hard for us to then explain to them that having gone through life that way, they can't do things together in the army.

• 1325

They can do things together in the army. We are very much behind it. Colonel Read and I are very much a part of the programs going on right now. If there was an omission here, it's an omission on my part, and I would even suggest to you that if I unconsciously omitted it, it might be because I believe so strongly that we're going to deal with the issue and we're going to deal with it in the right way that I didn't want to make it an issue in that sense, if that makes any sense to you.

The second question?

The Chairman: What about clothe-the-soldier? Why isn't it an ongoing process?

LGen W.C. Leach: It is an ongoing thing, and I probably misled you by saying that every year we have to buy just to keep the stock up, just to clothe the people who continue to serve.

What we're talking about here is changing everything in one dramatic way in about a three-year period. To do that, we have to package it the way we are, but before we get to year three of the project, I would suggest to you that we will already be making “maintenance buys”, if I can use that terminology, of the things that we bought in year one. It's an ongoing thing. So in the year 2000 or 2001, whenever these things are in service, it doesn't mean we all walk away from it and say again that for 30 years we don't have a problem. It's an everyday issue, and if we don't keep it an everyday issue, in 30 years from now we'll back here again.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Monsieur Benoit, one last quick question.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

In a 1996 study on suicide that was commissioned by the military, the report stated that there was too much emphasis on forging a tough and effective military force and not enough emphasis on tolerant handling of young soldiers with emotional problems. I'd like your comments on that statement. Are the two necessarily contradictory?

I think it's clear that we need a combat-ready force, a force that is ready to defend our sovereignty. We also need a force that's ready to deal with civil unrest and prisons—as we've seen recently—as a last resort, to go in there, and with stand-offs and the violence on Indian reserves. I think that unfortunately we're going to see more of that. Or possibly there will be violence stemming from the separatist movement in Quebec going sour and the frustration the separatists would feel. And we also need a force that's ready to deal with natural disasters and peacekeeping. We need forces to deal with all these situations.

Again, is there necessarily a contradiction between having combat-ready forces that are really keen, ready to go and ready to protect Canadians in a way that we will need again and dealing with soldiers in a way that will make them feel like they want to be a part of it and like they're doing something productive?

LGen W.C. Leach: Again, I don't know what my privileges are as I sit here, but as I answer this question I really don't want the answer that I'm going to give to you associated with some of the scenarios you lay out. I just don't want to touch some of that, because I don't want to be put on the spot. As far as I'm concerned—

Mr. Leon Benoit: They're my comments, the background—

LGen W.C. Leach: Okay.

Mr. Leon Benoit: —that's understood.

LGen W.C. Leach: Thank you.

I want to make sure that the soldiers I command, who serve this country, are able to do whatever the government and the population of this country asks them to do. I think that is my responsibility. I think it's my responsibility to make sure that they are as ready—as well equipped and as mentally and physically ready—as they have to be, and what the government chooses for those young men and women to do is what the government chooses. So that's the start to the answer.

• 1330

The answer, in my mind, is dead simple. There's stupid tough and there's smart tough. Stupid tough is attitudes from the past and the failure to understand that society around us has changed. It's a failure to understand that we have laws in this country that say there's a way for civilized human beings to deal with each other. As far as I'm concerned, those are all of the things that are important. In the context of all of that, there is a way to have the young men and women who are in the army of this country tough: you train them smartly because they're smart people and you don't do stupid things.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thank you very much. I really appreciate that answer.

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Mr. Chairman, may I ask another question?

The Chairman: A very short question.

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Thank you.

In your testimony, you talk about updating your doctrine. For me, the word “doctrine” means one thing and I wonder if it's the same. It might mean something else in English but why not simply use the word “mandate”? To me the word “doctrine” goes further than what I consider to be the “mandate” of the army. Could you give me some explanation?

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: Doctrine as I talked about it here is the written word on how we practise our profession in terms of process, in terms of organization.

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: “Organization”, yes, but not “doctrine”.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: Attitude is different.

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Yes, of course.

[English]

LGen W.C. Leach: I think I have a number of challenges, which I enjoy. One of them is that I have to take into account the attitudes that exist around us, the attitudes that exist in society now, the way our culture is changing. That relates back to my answer to Mr. Benoit, where I said that in 1997 and the year 2000 and beyond, I believe we have to train our people smartly. They still have to be tough, but we have to do it in the context of....

[Translation]

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. I will allow Mr. Pratt a last comment.

[English]

Mr. David Pratt: General, a little while back we had a discussion in this committee about the utility of having members of the committee go who haven't been to an area of operations like Bosnia. What would you recommend to us in terms of discharging our responsibilities?

LGen W.C. Leach: It's dead simple from my perspective. You are a whole bunch of things to me: you are a member of this committee; you're an elected politician in the country I am a part of; you're a taxpayer; you're just a common ordinary person on the street like I am when we go home at night. I will do anything that people don't tell me not to do to make sure that everybody in this country knows at least one of the soldiers who exists in this country and gets to see them in an operational environment. I really sincerely mean that.

Whatever we have to do to open ourselves up, what you have to do in the context of the way your committee works and how you organize these things, I'm not aware of, but the facts are there's nothing that I'm aware of.... In fact, if I thought there was something that said no, you can't go to place X, I would work overnight to undo that, because it's wrong. You have to know our people. They are so damn good and they need your support. Anything you can do to know them better, you can have it as far as I'm concerned.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

General, you are darn right about what you said about our Canadian Armed Forces. They are the best in the world. I just wanted to thank you very much for your comments this afternoon. I wanted to mention to you that you would have been a darn good politician judging by the answers you gave.

LGen W.C. Leach: Should I feel good about that?

The Chairman: I think you should feel good.

• 1335

This is our last committee in 1997. I just want to wish everybody a very merry Christmas and a happy new year, not only to my honourable colleagues, the ones who are here, but also to everybody on the committee and everyone who works with the committee, clerks and everyone. The best to all of you for 1998. Thank you.

The meeting is adjourned.