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]

Monday, March 30, 1998

• 1907

[English]

The Chairman (Mr. Robert Bertrand (Pontiac—Gatineau—Labelle, Lib.)): Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the evening edition of our hearings. I have four names on a list in front of me, and as we did this afternoon, I will be calling them out one by one. I will ask the four people to come up and make their presentations, which will then be followed by—and I say this for everybody—a short question-and-answer period.

One thing that I did not do this afternoon, and I'm sorry for it, is that I did not ask the MPs who are here with me to identify themselves and their ridings. Would they do so, please, so the people here will know who they're dealing with? Maybe I can start on my extreme right—and it has no bearing on politics, David.

Voices: Oh, oh.

Mr. David Price (Compton—Stanstead, PC): Thank you for that, Mr. Chairman. My name is David Price. I represent the riding of Compton—Stanstead. It's in the southern part of Quebec.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel (Chambly, BQ): My name is Ghislain Lebel. I represent the Chambly riding on the south shore of Montreal.

Mr. Leon E. Benoit (Lakeland, Ref.): I'm Leon Benoit, from Lakeland constituency. Cold Lake is in that constituency. I'm a Reform member of Parliament.

Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby—Ajax, Lib.): I'm Judi Longfield. I'm a Liberal member of Parliament representing the riding of Whitby—Ajax, which is just east of metropolitan Toronto.

Mr. Bob Wood (Nipissing, Lib.): I'm Bob Wood. I'm a member of Parliament for Nipissing, which takes in North Bay, where there's a CFB base. And Mr. Price over there is my mother's MP, in southern Quebec, so I have to watch out for him very carefully.

Voices: Oh, oh.

[Translation]

The Chairman: My name is Robert Bertrand. I represent the beautiful riding of Pontiac—Gatineau—Labelle, in the Outaouais.

[English]

We'll get started right away. I will now ask Lieutenant Martine Lauzé to please make her presentation.

[Translation]

Lieutenant Martine Lauzé (Individual Presentation): Good evening. I would like to talk about the disadvantages of being single in the Canadian Armed Forces. I will deal with three main points.

The first point pertains to the status we are given while we are taking courses. We are designated as being either on temporary duty or what is referred to as an attached posting.

Most of the people who take courses will be deemed to be on temporary duty, which means that the quarters and rations will be paid by the base or the unit providing the course, or by the soldier's own unit.

• 1910

When, however, you take a course while on an attached posting, which often occurs in the case of single people, you have to pay for you own rations. This results in additional expenditures for us because it usually costs you more to buy things at the base than it would if you were living at home.

This is what happened to me when I took a basic administration course. I was a graduate of Kingston Military College. I came here, at the base in Trenton, where I had a position—I was not on training—and then I was sent on course in September. I arrived here in May, and in September, I went to Borden to take an administration course.

I was sent there on an attached posting, which means that I had to continue paying rent, electricity, gas, telephone, etc. and, in addition, I had to pay for my quarters and food at Borden. I usually spend about $150 per month on food. There, I spent $350 per month on food.

The situation for married people was different. They were deemed to be on temporary duty; consequently, either they didn't have to pay for their rations or they were given a separation bonus, or something else along this line, which covered their costs.

Secondly, I'd like to talk about transfers. When you're transferred, you're given a half month's salary, or a month's salary when you have dependents. Single people are given only the half month's salary. However, I don't see the difference in moving costs between single people and people with dependents when it comes to reconnecting the telephone, purchasing new drapes and all of the other expenses. The expenses are the same, regardless of whether you're married or not. This half month salary is supposed to help us with our costs. That's my second point: the difference between the one-month salary paid to people with dependents and the half-month salary paid to single people.

The third point concerns choices in transfers. Most of the time—at any rate according to my personal experience—when you meet with the career officer, you're often given the last choice when it comes to transfers. Because you don't have any dependents, the career officers think that they can send you anywhere. I'd like to state here that we have preferences just like everyone else. People with dependents, people who are married and have children, have preferences and I understand this. However, I am not married and I too have preferences which should be taken into consideration just like those of everyone else. That was my third point.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. Do you have any questions for Ms. Lauzé? Mr. Lebel.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: Yes, I have a question on the third point, on the choice of transfers. When you said that your career officer did not take your choices into consideration, has he in fact forced you...

Lt Martine Lauzé: I can't say that he doesn't take preferences into consideration whatsoever. I don't want to generalize either. However, the situation has occurred where I have explained to my career officer that I had a boyfriend in Valcartier or that I really liked Montreal and was subsequently told that I would be sent wherever possible. He told me that married people were given priority because the husband or the wife was displaced.

As far as my career is concerned, I would at least like to be given an opportunity to state my preferences and to have the same opportunities as everyone else to get them.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: I have no further questions.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

[English]

Master Corporal Lucy Critch-Smith, please.

Master Corporal Lucy Critch-Smith (Individual Presentation): Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My issue is with the Department of Veterans Affairs. I forgot what I feel is an important point when I was here this afternoon.

When a person is medically released from the military, he or she has to go through a series of medicals through the Department of National Defence. If that person qualifies for long-term disability through SISIP, they have to go through SISIP's doctors for medicals. When that person goes through the Department of Veterans Affairs, they have to through their doctors, and then, if that person qualifies for Canada Pension Plan, he or she has to go through Canada Pension Plan doctors. So a person who has been released from the military can see as many as 20 different doctors over a certain period of time.

• 1915

What I don't understand is, we're looking at three government departments: the Department of National Defence; the Canada Pension Plan; and the Department of Veterans Affairs. What I don't understand is that these three government departments are not taking one doctor's assessment of that medical condition. If instead there was just one doctor, on behalf of all three government departments, saying, okay, this is the assessment I've reached, and if the member is agreeable to that, then why does a person have to go through so many different medicals?

It's like one department is saying they don't think your doctor has the credibility. They're not given the credibility of one department because they're with DVA as opposed to being with the military or with the Canada Pension Plan.

In hindsight, in dealing with DVA for so long, I feel this is one of the major reasons it takes so long for paperwork to be processed through DVA, Canada Pension Plan, and the military for release. The paperwork process is so long, and I feel this is one of the major reasons why.

Thank you.

The Chairman: I know Mr. Benoit has a question, but before I go to him, was there any cost involved on your part for all those certificates you had to get?

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: No, sir, and if there was an initial cost, we were reimbursed for those costs.

The Chairman: Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Were you reimbursed for travel, for all expenses like that?

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: Yes, sir.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I assume once you had the medical done, when you went to the next branch of government you told them that testing had been done already.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: Absolutely.

Mr. Leon Benoit: What was their response?

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: With my husband's case, I went through the Access to Information Act and got copies of his medical files. For each different department he had to go through, I had copies that I would give to the doctors. That cut down on some time, my taking those documents and photocopying them and saying here you go, instead of them going through his regular doctor or waiting for a medical file to show up on the desk, which could take months in some cases.

Mr. Leon Benoit: So you went through Access to Information to get those?

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: Yes, sir.

Mr. Leon Benoit: You couldn't get them on request?

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: No, sir.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Once you went to the second doctor or group of doctors, you had this report to show him or her already.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: Yes, sir.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I wonder if others would have had reports that would show the same thing, if they didn't have access to the original report. That may have certainly helped you along.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: Normally the process is that once a department requests that you see a doctor, or their doctor, or you have to have physician statements before you even get an appointment to see, for instance, the DVA doctor, you have to have a physician statement.

So you have to go see your family doctor, if you're released at that point. You have to have the physician statement. You have to have a medical through your family doctor. He fills out his little physician statement, and then you take that to DVA and photocopy it and fax it or mail it to them. Then their doctor takes a look at it, and they call you in for an appointment. Then you have to go to see that doctor for another medical.

I think that's one of the biggest problems with the process. For the paperwork, you're going through so many medicals; you're seeing so many doctors. It just takes so long.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Yes. It would be expensive, too. Thank you.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: You're welcome.

The Chairman: Mr. Price.

Mr. David Price: This afternoon you mentioned something about after 20 years of being in the service and retiring, selling your house, and some help in there.... I wasn't clear on that. Could you tell me a little bit more about that?

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: Okay. My question to you was, after 20 years of service, when you're released.... For instance, if I finish my career here at Trenton and I'm released here, 'm not entitled to the guaranteed buy-back program for my house that I've purchased here. My question is, why is that? Why do I have to wait until I get 25 years in to be eligible for that buy-back program?

• 1920

Mr. David Price: I see. At 25 years you are.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: I could be wrong, but my understanding is that at 25 years you are eligible for it.

Mr. David Price: But anytime before that you're not.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: At 20 years, no, sir.

Mr. David Price: Okay. That's interesting. Thank you.

MCpl Lucy Critch-Smith: You're welcome.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

We now have two witnesses to come forward, Britta Foster and Gwen Perrault.

Ms. Britta Foster (Individual Presentation): Good evening.

We're here to express our concern and disappointment regarding PMQ allocation. Several large families with four or more children have applied to CFHA to move into four-bedroom houses on Hewson Boulevard or Breadner Boulevard. We've applied to have our names put on a waiting list. These houses provide an additional 240 square feet of living space, including an extra washroom and an extra room on the main floor. This is compared to the other style of four-bedroom PMQs available on this base.

CFHA is supportive of this issue; however, the wing commander is not. Currently he has the power to decide who has access to these particular houses, that being master warrant officers, chief warrant officers, captains, and above.

I suggest there be a change in policy to enable CFHA to determine allocation of all PMQs based on family size and needs, not rank. Families do not have a rank.

Thank you for listening.

Ms. Gwen Perrault (Individual Presentation): I'm basically going to ditto what my friend Britta just said. I'm expecting my sixth child, and I agree that housing is a basic human need, regardless of rank. We're hoping other people see it that way eventually.

That's about all I have to say. Thank you.

The Chairman: Ms. Perrault, you say you have five kids now and how many bedrooms?

Ms. Gwen Perrault: We have four bedrooms and one bathroom.

The Chairman: Four bedrooms and one bathroom. Wow!

Ms. Gwen Perrault: Yeah.

The Chairman: Okay, thanks.

Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: Are there a lot of these houses available or are there long waiting lists?

Ms. Britta Foster: When we applied, three of them were empty. Nobody met the rank requirement. They had been sitting empty for months. One has been sitting empty for about a year, I believe, and it's still empty.

Mr. Bob Wood: So there are three of these houses that would be adequate for your family.

Ms. Britta Foster: Two have been filled with smaller families now.

Mr. Bob Wood: Okay, thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Corporal Denis Paquet.

[Translation]

Corporal Denis Paquet (Individual Presentation): Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. My question will deal with entitlements that I had while in Quebec, namely, my hunting licence from the Quebec Department of Wildlife. When I was transferred to Borden, I had to advise the department that I had been transferred to Ontario. What did the department do? It cancelled my licence. In other words, the department discarded my licence but I was still entitled to come back to Quebec in order to hunt providing that I paid as a non-resident.

This doesn't make sense. I continue voting in my riding, back home. Why should I have to pay $200 and more if I want to go moose hunting back home, when in fact I'm still voting for my member of Parliament or my minister there? I don't understand and this doesn't make sense to me. I have communicated with the department again and was told that this was stated in the law.

When I came back to Ontario and wanted to hunt in this province, I was told that the Quebec card wasn't valid here. Consequently, I had to take a course and find out, once again, about the little ducks that swim and other things like that. Enough is enough. We have one government and we're supposed to be treated equally everywhere. I have rights. I'm not in the RCMP, but I do work for a federal department and I have the same rights as they do. That was my first point.

• 1925

Secondly, I'd like to talk about moving claims. Why is it so difficult getting reimbursed for goods that are damaged during a move? You have to fill out a ton of forms and contact your insurance company. Then you have to wait for the appraiser that they'll send you, etc. Is it normal to have to wait six or seven months before getting reimbursed?

The only way to get paid is when you lose your temper, when you lose your cool, when you get angry. Then, all of a sudden, you're told that a representative from the department will be coming to assess the damages and that you will be paid. Does that make sense? I have moved twice and both times there were damages. I prefer to swallow my pill than to start fighting with them and have to wait for six months. No thanks. It's not good to do this, but having to wait six or seven months only to find yourself at the same point in the reimbursement process...

My third point will deal with family housing. I understand that if you don't have the means to pay for a general's house, you can't expect to live in one. However, as the woman said earlier, this woman who's expecting her sixth child, if her husband is not in any financial difficulty, why not give him permanent married quarters, modern housing? The reason they give, as the major told me, is that they can't put a little corporal on the same footing as someone with the rank of officer.

As far as I'm concerned, my neighbour to the right and my neighbour to the left are fathers or mothers. I am a father and my wife is a mother. As far as what is inside us is concerned, we are all the same. When we live together, we form a community. If you're able to pay for your housing, you should be entitled to it.

I understand that some housing is more expensive than others. If someone has money problems, it is understandable that this person should not have access to the more expensive housing. However, if he's able to pay for it, he should have it. Thank you.

The Chairman: As to the damages sustained during a move, is this covered by insurance or do the movers pay for the costs?

Cpl. Denis Paquet: Usually we are told that our insurance is supposed to cover damages. First of all, we have to submit a claim with the moving company. We inform the movers, who tell us that we have to notify our insurance company. There's a lot of paperwork to be done. They tell us that they will send an appraiser to assess the damages, and then they do nothing, not until we show up at the mover's office and tell him to pay us or we'll strangle him. Then he says that he will send somebody else. And then we wait and wait and, suddenly, something happens. But if you know someone who works in the office, you get looked after before everyone else.

The Chairman: Do you contact somebody from the base or are you supposed to take all the initiative?

Cpl. Denis Paquet: You're supposed to advise someone at the base as well, if I'm not mistaken. You advise the mover about the damages sustained; you fill out a report here at the base about the same damage; you then call your insurance company and then you have to do a lot of running around: you go to the insurance company, you go to see the mover, you go back to the insurance company and then back to the moving company, until everything gets settled and you're paid. That's how it works.

The Chairman: How long does this usually take?

Cpl. Denis Paquet: Ah! It can take a long time! Ask the people who came back from Germany how much time it took.

The Chairman: Are we talking about one month, two months, three months?

Cpl. Denis Paquet: Six months and perhaps a year. Some people had to wait a long time.

The Chairman: I believe that Mr. Lebel has a question.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: This is the second time that I've heard about this today. Who chooses the moving company? Do you make the choice or is it the army?

Cpl. Denis Paquet: Usually you have to go by a list of movers. I have already worked in the moving sector. A mover is entitled to a certain number of moves, 20 moves per year. As soon as he has his quota, he has to give his spot to somebody else.

So if you have a personal preference, as I did, you're told that it is impossible to hire this mover because he reached his quota and is not entitled to exceed a certain number of moves per year for the Department of Defence. So you have to give a chance to some other firm.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: I would like to know who, from a legal standpoint, is the one who does the hiring?

Cpl. Denis Paquet: We can't choose our...

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: The person who hires the mover, the person who pays him, that's the employer, the Department of National Defence.

Cpl. Denis Paquet: That's right.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: So if the department chooses someone that happens to coincide with your preferences, that's great, otherwise, it's the department that has the last word.

Cpl. Denis Paquet: That's right.

Mr. Ghislain Lebel: Okay, thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

• 1930

Sergeant Louis Bédard.

[English]

Sergeant Louis Bédard (Individual Presentation): Good evening, and bonsoir. Thank you for taking the time to listen to some of our observations and complaints.

My question is an observation with reference to moving claims. I don't know how familiar you are with the moving regulations. When you move, depending on how many possessions you have accumulated through your career—some of us have more than others; we call it junk—they will come and do a pre-packing. They will select items you will not need in the next week, or during the move, and they will pre-pack it to make the move easier and smoother.

The problem isn't with the pre-packing. They'll come to your house in advance and they'll pre-pack you, and your junk does get put aside from the stuff you may need. When they come and do the packing itself—and it could be a week after—they'll load it onto a truck.

My observation is that I don't feel I should be expected and requested to pack dirty linens, dirty towels, and dirty pots and pans. I'll explain.

When they come to load you after the pre-packing is done, everything is scheduled ahead. They'll tell you, for instance, they'll be there to pack you tomorrow morning. Therefore, at 8 a.m. the movers show up at your house, with packers and a whole lot of people. The house is theirs. It's not yours any more. As soon as they walk in your house, the house is theirs. Your possessions are theirs to pack. You are there to get out of the way, because they have a job to do. They have limited time. When you have big loads, it can take the whole day.

My point is, the night before, we are expected to stay in the house and use the beds, the linens, the mattress covers. We are expected to eat breakfast the next morning in the house, and use the pots and pans. Because that's not covered. I've tried to claim this for many years—and I've been around for quite a few years—but it was always rejected. They said if they did it for me, they'd have to do it for everybody else.

I don't think it's fair that we are expected to stay. I never have. I've taken my family in to town, and so far in my career, I've taken the cost, because I figured my family was more important. I didn't expect to pack dirty clothes, such as linens and sheets and stuff like that. For the rest, it's no problem; it's just the sheets, the towels, the pots and pans.

That night I moved downtown and stayed in a hotel. My sheets were washed, my towels were washed, and my pots and pans and dishwasher were clean. The washing machine also was clean. The next morning, when they come at 8 a.m., they expect to have a clean washing machine and a clean everything else. If it's not clean, too bad, so sad.

You've heard stories here. I don't know if you people travel, but believe me....

I apologize that I haven't had a chance to check if it's the same for other federal employees, but for the military, I know that's the way it is.

The second part to my observation is that when you get to your location after they unpack you—it's called the “unload”—the movers are expected, and requested, to set up your beds and open your linens, towels, sheets, and things you need that night and the next morning. You're expected and requested to stay in your house that night.

Again, I don't think it's fair. Some of us may have smaller loads and less junk than others. It's not my fault if I have more possessions. As a family grows, sometimes we acquire more possessions. Sometimes, if we get divorced or remarried or your spouse happens to die, and you remarry, it could become big also.

So I don't think it's fair. There is enough stress on a family before you move. It's a big trauma. Kids have to leave their friends. You have to leave your house, your family, your friends. You have to leave your job and you don't want to go. But we go. I don't want anything for that, but it's not fair, on top of the other stress, that again at the end of the move, on the first night, if you don't stay in your house, too bad, so sad, you will not be reimbursed for that. The book is straightforward on that. They will ask you if the movers set up your beds, and if the answer is yes, then too bad, so sad, you will not be reimbursed.

• 1935

Some of us try doing one of them. My family comes first. Money is money. You can't take it with you when you die. Most of the time I stay in a hotel that night. I think after the stress you've gone through you deserve a break.

Therefore, for the night before the packers come we should be reimbursed for hotels. I'm not talking meals; I'm talking hotels. And the night you get unpacked you should be allowed to stay in a hotel, and the next morning you can come in fresh and able to do your job.

Thank you very much.

[Translation]

The Chairman: One moment, please.

[English]

When they come into your new house, they set everything up?

Sgt Louis Bédard: You have a choice, sir. What they have to set up, according to the books, is your beds. Then, if you so desire, they will unpack your boxes, all your possessions. I have the right to ask for that, but it's the last thing you want to do, because you don't know where to put your stuff. Every house is different. Some of the boxes are labelled. They could have labelled something that's not even in the box. So the last thing you want to do is have 20,000 pounds of stuff in the house with no place to put it. We just get the minimum unpacked. Then we go around after that and the next morning we start deciding where we're going to put our stuff.

Does that answer your question?

The Chairman: When you say they make the bed, do you mean they put the bed together, or do they put the blankets on?

Sgt Louis Bédard: They set up the frame and put on the mattress, and they have to do that for each of the beds. As long as they meet that, they met their regulations.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Bev Warden.

Ms. Bev Warden (Individual Presentation): I have two major issues I'd like to talk about, but first I'd like to touch on what Gwen said earlier, that there is insufficient housing out there. I have five kids living in my house right now, three of whom are teenagers, and I have two kids who come every other weekend. So I have nine people stuck in my house and I have a four-bedroom house. Even another bathroom would be amazing. I just wanted to touch on that.

Morale. For most of the people I talk to money is not the issue; it's the workplace that's the issue. There is so little morale left. When your husband comes home every night and he's angry because he can't go to work and enjoy his job any more and he can't do his job properly because of so many extenuating circumstances, or he has a hundred different things to do and he's working under 900 different people and he can't get any job completed—and he's a perfectionist—because he has to work for so many other people, so the lack of organization.... To me, not wanting to go to work because he can't do his job is sad. That's very sad. Having no faith in your superiors really bites into wanting to go to work.

The last thing is the PERs. They're a joke. I just want you guys to know that. What happened to merit? That's not what's going on in the PERs. They are not getting the recognition. This is across the board; this isn't just my husband. They're not getting what they deserve to have written on their PERs. There's stuff that won't even go on there. If you're the new guy in the shop, too bad for you, your PER is going to stink that year. That's guaranteed. You can look at that because it's everywhere.

• 1940

If you've been there for 100 years, guess who's going to get the next promotion? It doesn't matter how good you are, you're getting the next promotion. What kind of incentive is that for the guys “down under”?

My husband is 27 years old and he's already resigned himself to the fact that he's going to be a corporal for the rest of his life. How's that for sad? Why do your job? You're not going anywhere. You're going to get paid anyway.

Keeping things the way they are is not doing anybody any good. That's basically it.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Captain Andy Cook.

Captain Andy Cook (Individual Presentation): I just have a quick comment I'd like to make. I think the format here, the forum to hear the concerns of the members and the families of the Canadian Forces, is an excellent one. I applaud you all for coming out here and I thank you. Unfortunately, I just found out about this over dinner, so my comments are not prepared comments.

I'd like to follow up on what the lady who just spoke said. I think there is a morale crisis in the Canadian Forces. I think it behoves everyone, members and families of the Canadian Forces, to do their best to create good morale and to try to make the workplace a better place for all. But I think there is definitely a problem, and I'm sure some of the comments that you people have been hearing as you've toured the country have probably echoed that.

I think it's very sad that there's one day left for one of the greatest old traditions—a tradition in the Canadian Air Force, anyway—and that's the officers' mess in CFB Trenton. After tomorrow there will no longer be any dinner service or lunch service or anything like that. Everyone will have to go to the Yukon Galley, which is a fine establishment, but I think that given some of the events of the Somalia inquiry and that sort of thing, like the emphasis on officers' behaviour and ethics and officers behaving as officers, it's perhaps worthy of study to see how much it's worth to the Canadian Forces and the Canadian people to treat officers like officers.

I understand that the money is the bottom line. You can only do so much with the money you have. I know the wing commander's budget constraints are very great and he has an operational role to carry out with a very fixed amount of funds, and that applies to everyone, just as it applies to me as a taxpayer.

But I would just like to make the point—and I know I speak for a lot of my own colleagues when I say that you people could take back as a message that sometimes the dollar sign cannot always be the bottom line. There is a cost to doing business and a cost to morale, a cost to keeping the people happy in their jobs and willing and eager to serve their country. I would very much appreciate it if you could take that message back with you.

It's very hard these days, I would think, to convince a private in the infantry to go over the top of the trenches and stand in front of a bullet when he doesn't have enough money to make ends meet and has to work delivering pizza on the weekends. I've seen that myself in my short time in the Canadian military.

My plea and my request is this. Maybe you can take back a message that the bottom line isn't always the dollar sign and that perhaps we should put the people just a little bit higher. I know people are trying to do that. I just don't always see it happening where I work.

Thank you.

The Chairman: Just a minute, please. I think Mr. Wood has a question for you.

Mr. Bob Wood: I had a question for Bev, but she left before I had a chance...but that's all right. It has to do with the same thing, and that's really incentives. We've been trying to work on this or just think of different ways ranks could be rewarded for...it's just incentive pay. I think Bev mentioned this, about her husband being a corporal. Obviously there are four steps. Correct me if I'm wrong when I go through this, because I'm not too sure how this works. Each rank has four incentive levels. Is that basically how it works?

Capt Andy Cook: That's not exactly true, sir. As a captain, my pay—

Mr. Bob Wood: A captain has eight or something, doesn't he?

Capt. Andy Cook: Ten.

Mr. Bob Wood: Ten. But the enlisted people have four, right?

Capt Andy Cook: I don't know, sir.

Mr. Bob Wood: I think that's right.

Ms. Bev Warden: That's right.

Mr. Bob Wood: Somebody came up with a great idea today, and I don't know if we could ever put this in, but the fact that these people are stuck in rank for a number of years...if they go to corporal they're obviously going to stay there for awhile because of the fact that there are not a lot of postings going on.

• 1945

Something was suggested today, and I don't know if this is a good idea, but it sounded good to me. There could be trade exams after a year as a performance bonus. Somebody would have to write an exam on his trade. If he got—this is an an arbitrary figure—85% or whatever, he would be eligible for a performance bonus.

Capt Andy Cook: Hear, hear.

Mr. Bob Wood: You're laughing—

Capt Andy Cook: I'm not laughing, sir.

Mr. Bob Wood: If you have a better idea, I'd love to hear it. This was given to me today when we were talking to some of the enlisted people over in one of the hangars. One of the warrant officers came up with that idea.

I thought it wasn't a bad idea. It would be a way that enlisted people could get some extra money. Officers, maybe, could go through that. This guy was a warrant officer, so he wasn't too worried, I guess, about the officers, but he certainly was worried about his people below him. That was one of his suggestions.

I'm just throwing that out to see if it's doable. Do you think it is?

Capt Andy Cook: I can't really comment on that. I know that as a pilot in the Canadian Forces right now in my eighth year, pay incentives are something that are certainly very prominent in my thoughts right now. If I could give you my own opinion, it would be that pay incentives are certainly a valid thing.

I've seen a lot of my colleagues leave the Canadian Forces, and it was not because they didn't like the Canadian Forces. They loved the flying and wanted to be part of it, but the attractions on the civilian side were too great to turn down. The money, benefits, time spent at home, and all those sorts of things were just too difficult to turn down. We're seeing pilots leaving the Canadian Forces in droves right now, and it is a serious crisis.

It's something that affects personally. I don't think that pay and incentives are always the pre-eminent things; quality of life is a big thing. I think it's sad that the Canadian Forces have had to close the base schools. So now, when people move on postings, education suffers. People going from one province to another have to get integrated into another educational system and that sort of thing. It's very hard on people.

There are a lot of issues out there. I think they all come down to the bottom line that Bev alluded to earlier. I don't want to give any solutions here because that's not my job, but for whatever reason, I think there are a lot of people out there who are not happy.

My point was merely that the dollar sign is important. You can't overspend or live beyond your means, but sometimes when we're budgeting and trying to devise what our means are, maybe we should consider that what's going to make the people happy is a very valuable expense.

That was my point.

Mr. Bob Wood: Bev, do you have anything to add to that?

Ms. Bev Warden: I like the idea of it. I don't know how much luck you could have implementing it. The bottom line to that one is that getting recognition for the good work you do is very important, but sometimes, just getting the recognition at all, such as in the military the way it is now, is almost as important as the monetary end of it, because there is no recognition. In theory, it's a great idea if you can get it to happen.

Mr. Bob Wood: I thought it was kind of an interesting idea. Coming from a warrant officer, I thought maybe it wasn't such a bad idea. He obviously was very concerned about his people.

It was something, as I said, that we've been trying to figure out. As we have been travelling around, we've been trying to figure out some way of doing this or some way of getting it done so that people would have something to look forward to. So if they do come to the end of their full incentive levels—say they are a corporal—you're still recognizing them for a job well done. Even if they stay a corporal for whatever period of time, it still recognizes the fact that they're very good at their job and they should be rewarded for it. Why should they stay at the same level for a number of years?

Ms. Bev Warden: That kind of thing would be good now since there are no postings or promotions going on. Then the incentive is still there and you still do get the recognition for the work you're doing. That would be a good point.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes. Thank you. Thanks for coming back.

• 1950

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'd like to ask actually both of you this. You've kind of touched on it a little bit, but I'd just like to ask you, Andy, to think back to your career, and Bev, from hearing from your husband for quite a few years, to try to pinpoint what you think are the major factors that have led to this low morale.

Ms. Bev Warden: There's a list about this long. I'll just start with what comes to my mind.

People are promoted who really don't deserve it, and it's not a jealousy thing; it happens everywhere. That's not one of my husband's issues. That's across the board.

There is no trust in the abilities of the people above you. It's not necessarily about trusting them as humans; it's in their ability to do their job.

There is no trust in the training of some of the people around you. It's hard to go to work when you're afraid to work with people, and that happens across the board, too.

Not getting recognition.... I know somebody who created a new tool to help do a job fixing the SAR helicopters. It was an excellent invention, and you're only patted on the back. They said, “This is really great.” It did not go on her PER. They told her, “You can ask why it didn't go on there, but I don't have to answer you.” That was their response. That is ridiculous. She won't even fight it. She said, “Why bother?”

Touching on that point, because it really makes me angry.... Since that point, the last time the base commander had a chat like this with some of the other people, he said, “Everybody say what you want to say; it will not be held against you.” Guess what? This person is not working on the SAR helicopters any more. I believe she's working in armament now. They say it's because of her long-term disability. She doesn't have a long-term disability. She hurt her leg while playing a sport and it says right on her medical that it's short-term; as soon as it heals, she's happy. That was the excuse they used to move her, and it was after the base commander said, “Hey, say what you have to say.” Her issue was morale.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Did you get a feeling that some people weren't willing to come out here today?

Ms. Bev Warden: Oh, a lot of people aren't willing, sir, because they're afraid of the ramifications, and there are ramifications. That is not a secret. It happens. This is the real world. It does happen.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Andy, have you anything...?

Capt Andy Cook: I have no such fears.

Mr. Leon Benoit: No?

Capt Andy Cook: I'm not trying to disagree with anything Bev has said. I'm just saying that I don't see those things in my day-to-day life. I have to underscore, first of all, that I'm not actually posted to Trenton; I'm on course. I've been on course here for three months.

Something Bev said earlier, though, is true, but I think it merits some qualification. I myself have been posted off a training jet onto the Hercules, and when I go to my squadron I cannot hope but that I will get a normal or average personnel evaluation report for this year. That's not because I'm being penalized because I'm being moved; it's just that I don't know anything about this airplane, so you can't expect me to come across and shine in comparison to other people who have been there for 30-odd years.

However, if I were to put my finger on something from my colleagues that might be a cause—you asked me for something that could be a cause of low morale—I might say that sometimes there's a perception that we're trying to do too much in the Canadian Forces and that maybe we need to really focus our roles and define them in something that we can do and we can do very well, whether that is peacekeeping or whether that is aid to civil power, or whatever it is.

I think there is a perception on the street—and I'm not really speaking for myself; I'm just talking about a general perception—that sometimes in the Canadian Forces we ask people to be jacks of all trades instead of focusing on one primary role or a few primary roles. We're reducing in personnel all the time, so I think maybe there's a perception that if we were more focused in what we did, we could do it very well and be very proud of it.

• 1955

I think there are a lot of incentives out there, and all the wings are trying their best to improve the quality of life for the people who are on the bases.

The air force had its Flight Plan 97 seminars, which I'm sure you're familiar with, that tried to improve communications between ranks. I was fortunate enough to be a facilitator for those. I think it was a good thing. Those are all things that move in the right direction. But my one point is that maybe sometimes we try to do too much instead of focusing and doing something very well.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Andy, I just want to ask you about the bonus that's been talked about for pilots to keep them in the service. I'm just wondering how you think others, who also are very specialized in what they do and have a service that is in demand in the private sector, would feel if the pilots are singled out to get this bonus when they're in a very similar situation and there's no talk of it whatsoever.

Capt Andy Cook: I feel like I'm on the hot seat here, sir. I'll choose my words very carefully in responding to your question. From a supply and demand perspective or simple economics, it makes sense that if someone is going to pay someone or give them more incentives to perform a service, people will probably move to that person, whether that person is with the Canadian Forces, an airline, in the case of the pilots, or what have you. You just can't stop that. That's sort of free market economics and there's nothing anybody can do about it.

On the pilot situation right now, if the Canadian Forces and the Department of National Defence were able—a lot of people say willing, but I don't think it's a question of being willing—to give pilots the incentives the airlines can give them, you probably wouldn't have the problem of people getting out. But I don't know. I'm not an expert on this.

I think it would apply for any classification or trade in the Canadian Forces. If there were an intense demand for it on the street and people were willing to pay more, I think you'd see the problem. People would be getting out, and I don't think there's anything you can do.

We had that problem in the past with lawyers and doctors in the Canadian Forces. The solution proposed, as I understand it, was to pay them and give them the same sorts of benefits they would receive as civilian practitioners. Whether that retained more or not, I'm not an expert and I couldn't say, but it's my impression it did.

I guess that's the long-winded and sort of roundabout way of saying it probably simply boils down to this. If you want to keep them in, you have to keep people happy and you have to pay them or give them some kind of incentive to stay that will be at least as good as what they would get elsewhere, or they won't stay. It's probably as simple as that, whether they're pilots, doctors, lawyers, metal fitters, or whatever.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thanks.

Capt Andy Cook: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Mr. Richard Abram.

Mr. Richard Abram (Individual Presentation): Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I figure I'm a prime candidate here. I have 16 days left in the Canadian Armed Forces. I took a voluntary release.

To backtrack a little bit, what some people have been talking about is what they call lateral trade progression. That was squashed. I don't have all the information on it, but I believe it comes from the Treasury Board.

I'm being released from the military voluntarily. You were talking about incentives and so forth in regard to pilots and so forth. I think it's great that pilots are getting incentives to sign up, but the military has to complete the job.

In the civilian sector right now—I can only speak on behalf of my own experiences—people from the presidents of companies right down to the bottom get performance bonuses. My girlfriend will be receiving a $2,000 performance bonus this April for completing her job objectives. The military also gives performance bonuses at the high end of the scale of our command. That, I find—

Mr. Leon Benoit: I don't think those are performance bonuses. They seem to go to everyone.

Mr. Richard Abram: In regard to the $4,000, let's say, or the—

Mr. Leon Benoit: There are varying amounts. Some are much higher.

Mr. Richard Abram: Yes, there are varying amounts.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Some call them performance bonuses. They say they're not and they go to everyone. So are you saying all—

• 2000

Mr. Richard Abram: Is that everyone in the sense of just officers, or non-commissioned members? I'm a non-commissioned member.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I mean to all of the people in the right categories, which is the upper—

Mr. Richard Abram: I understand the upper echelon coming out with a directive and getting bonuses, but in reality you have to think of the bottom line here. I can't speak for everybody here, only on my own behalf, but in my opinion you have to think of the guy at the bottom. You have the guy on the top who comes out with the directives, but it's the guy on the bottom who's doing all the work. He's the guy who's making the job come together. Without him you have nothing. You have absolutely nothing.

I've been hearing that a lot of people are disgruntled. You talked about a morale problem. You have a severe morale problem. It's not always in regard to pay. It's more in career progression. I've been in the service for 15 years. I'm taking my voluntary release because it's better out on Civvy Street. I'm going back to school. I'm going to graduate. I'll have a degree. I'll make more money on the outside. I'll have more money. It's as simple as that. I'll get overtime. I'll get paid bonuses.

The Canadian military cannot pay me enough promotion-wise. A lot of guys sit there and they'll say, I have seven years left till pension. Yes, a lot of guys are sitting there saying that because they're not getting promoted. It's no longer a career. When I joined the Canadian Forces in 1983 I considered it a career. I was going to be promoted. I was going to rise up in the ranks and maybe retire as chief warrant officer. Who knows? But I was going to be promoted. It stopped being a career and became just a plain old job when there were no more promotions, no more pay raises.

I go to work in the morning. I do my job. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy my job. I still like it, but I want to move on. I want to jump the corporate scale. That's what I want. I don't want to be stuck as a corporal for 20 years. To be honest with you, that's almost embarrassing to me. I'm proud of what I do, but I don't want to say, yes, I retired as a corporal at 20 years. People look at you and say, heck, where have you been? I've been here, here, and here. Mind you, I've travelled the world. It's been rewarding. I've learned a lot. I've seen a lot, but there comes a time. There are people who are happy to stay a corporal their whole life and have no initiative to carry on. But there are people like me who want to climb the corporate ladder, who want to get up in the higher ranks.

I'm going to school. I'm going to the University of Ottawa in computer science. I'm going to get an engineering degree. To be honest with you, why I didn't do it through the military is because I don't want to jump through their hoops. I don't want to pay their price. It's not rewarding enough. It's not me any more. There's more out there. It's better out there, and that's the thing. That's what a lot of guys are looking at.

There are résumés. The guys I work with, hundreds of them, have résumés sent out. Why? Because it's better out there. A lot of guys are going back to school. A lot of guys go to night school and upgrade, take college courses through correspondence and so forth. Why? To better themselves, because when they get out of the military they're not going to have a whole lot for their pension and whatever education they got in the military.

I thank the military. I thank the military very much for teaching me everything they did. They're the ones who opened my eyes to see what I'm actually good at. I'm good at electronics. I'm smart at it. I enjoy it. It's fun. That's why I'm gone in 16 days.

The Chairman: Are you finished, Mr. Abram?

Mr. Richard Abram: I am, thanks.

The Chairman: Okay, Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I want to ask you a question. You talked about how you don't want to stay there at the rank of corporal. What if there were categories? You're in electronics.

Mr. Richard Abram: I'm an aviation technician.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Even staying at the rank of corporal, if you could move up while being recognized as specializing, and moving up as a specialist in your field as an aviation technician, with the pay of course increasing while moving up the specialist ladder, would you be satisfied with that?

Mr. Richard Abram: Not right now, I wouldn't, no, because I have things on the go.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Would you have been if you hadn't made the decision to go already?

Mr. Richard Abram: If I hadn't made my decision, I wouldn't have a problem with them instituting lateral trade progression. In fact, they've somewhat instituted...they've combined their trades. Right now I'm a jack of all trades, you could say, unless I go into avionics. Right now I can do armament, safety systems, instrument electrician, aero-engine, and air-frame. That's five jobs I can be qualified to do.

• 2005

I'm not going to go on to pay. That's been covered how many hundreds of times? I'm not going to bother with that. But you need some type of reward.

They're also instituting new signature policies for signing off airplanes. Before, you had to have a first column signature, a second column signature, and in some cases an independent and a “certified by”. Now, if you get qualified at a certain level, you scratch off the first column and sign on the second column. That's a big responsibility, signing for that aircraft, saying it is serviceable.

In my view, the person signing the second column isn't releasing the plane, but he is responsible for the work that was done. He's saying the work that was done was done by the technical orders and is to be released: it's safe to fly. That's a big responsibility. But where's the pay for it? Where's the pay for all this additional responsibility?

We're getting more privates in. You have to watch them more closely. We're getting private AVN techs in, and these people who are qualified at the second column level must supervise them. They must watch them. They're going to sign for the work. It's just a lot more responsibility.

So in other words, someone has five jobs incorporated into one trade now, and he can scratch off the first and sign the second. You can still call for the first column if you want, but you can also call for the second column. The person signing the second column is the one who's taking all the responsibility. Where's the reward for all this work and knowledge?

A lot of people are finding the upper echelon.... Let's go from, say, warrant officer, master warrant officer, chief warrant officer, and up. The upper echelon is stagnant. I have nothing against anybody, but these people are holding up the line of promotions, and that's one of the problems it's causing.

My position held here in CFB Trenton as an AVN technician, my REMAR number is no longer. It's gone. My position is gone out of the entire Canadian Forces. No one's going to replace me. That means more responsibility and more work for the other technicians.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thank you, Richard.

Mr. Richard Abram: You're welcome.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Corporal Mark Quade.

Corporal Mark Quade (Individual Presentation): Hello, ladies and gentlemen. I'm here to talk about a fundamental problem in the CF right now, which is leadership.

To use a nineties word, we talk about managers. DND does not need managers; we need leaders. The issue of being managers and being paid on par with the public service managers would work fine if we had decent managers. DND wouldn't be as screwed up as it is right now if we had decent managers. The 500 series of trades are a good example of this, where there's a stagger of almost 10 years between the privates and the corporals who are in now.

The other issue I'd like to address is the point about the pilots and this incentive pay category. In the other officer programs out there, they make service mandatory for the years they get paid for university, i.e., if they do five years of university, then they're required to do at least five years of obligatory service after their initial training. So if it costs $1 million to train a pilot, then why not make it $20,000 for every year of obligatory service and make them do a 20-year term without the ability to get out, and if they do get out, penalize them?

That's it.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Mr. Wood, do you have questions?

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes.

Mark, when I was talking to some of the people today, a gentleman gave me this brown envelope, and it had a number of things on it: leadership, deployment, alternative service, and trade amalgamation. You touched on leadership, and there's a line in here that maybe you could elaborate and expand on for me.

• 2010

This gentlemen who gave me this says—and I guess he wrote this—“We no longer have leadership by example. We have consensus leadership.” He says that from the technician on the floor, up the chain, there isn't much faith in the leadership. What does he mean by that? Can you just expand on that?

Cpl Mark Quade: I have no idea what that gentleman wrote there. From my point of view...and we've had a meeting here where we've had senior officers say, “Morale is not my problem.” They're there to motivate us. If we're not motivated, how can we motivate the people who work below us? If they're only token leaders, figureheads, then why not just hire a consultant to do that for us?

Leadership is not something you can teach. It's in each one of us to a certain degree.

Mr. Bob Wood: So obviously he's saying here that the leaders are afraid to take a stand. Is that basically it? He's saying that they have consensus leadership. Do they go up to somebody and ask, “What do you think of this idea?”, and then to somebody else and ask them? Is that what he's getting at? And is he saying that then they make a decision based on that instead of saying, “Listen, this is how I see it, this is the leadership I'm going to provide, this is the way we're going”? Is that what's happening?

Cpl Mark Quade: In my view, and this is my personal opinion, I think careerism is a goal right now. It's “what can I do?”; it's to appease the yes masters in NDHQ and say, “Oh, we can do that, we can do that, we can do that.” But there are a lot of people being stepped on for that.

I joined 15 years ago. Safety was one of the things that was always taught to you: “You will do this safely and you will always do things safely.” That's being pushed aside because safety costs money.

A prime example of that would be the Arrow. They've had two people fall off aircraft, that I know of, and at least one person has broken his back. They've gone out now, yes, and they've purchased aircraft stands, but this is after 35 years of working on a Herc and they're only being purchased now. They're still not on base yet. From what I've heard—and this is only the rumour mill and I'm hoping it can be cleared up soon—the aircraft stands are being delayed. Yet there are still technicians walking around aircraft, and you can only do things so safely, without compromising your job performance.

Mr. Bob Wood: So they're delaying getting the safety stands?

Cpl Mark Quade: They should have been here years ago.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes.

Cpl Mark Quade: But everything is money-driven. The root of it—

Mr. Bob Wood: How do they get away with that?

Voices: Oh, oh.

Mr. Bob Wood: No. If you go in to a—

Cpl Mark Quade: I'm the second best on the floor and I'm down here, and then you have your upper echelon and it's up there. So my opinions, what I say, and memorandums that I do, they don't go very far. You guys are our avenue. I hope that after your dealings with the base you guys are around for a very long time.

Mr. Bob Wood: But just on that safety end of it, if you walk into any other aircraft maintenance place, other than the armed forces, I guess, you see these things; they have to get them by law. I just speak from example. I'm from North Bay. We lost all our aircraft and obviously we don't have any flying by the air force, but we've been able to utilize the hangars. We now have Voyageur Airways in one of those hangars. They're doing a lot of refitting and retooling of Dash 7s and some of the new aircraft that are coming out. They have to go out and buy this type of equipment, because they're walking on the wings; they're doing a lot of retooling and refitting of aircraft.

So why the delay? I guess I can't understand what the delay is, why these people aren't buying this equipment. It's a safety precaution. It's in the workplace.

Cpl Mark Quade: Because we're not the pointy end of the stick, I guess; we're only the people who get the people there to the pointy end of the stick.

Mr. Bob Wood: Well, it's pretty sad. Thanks, though. Thank you very much.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Corporal Heather McRitchie.

Corporal Heather McRitchie (Individual Presentation): Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much for coming here and trying to figure out a little bit of what's going on with us.

Earlier you were talking about having bonuses given out to certain trades. Bonuses should be given out to all trades. We have cut down, we have minimalized, we have micro-managed everything right down to the last thing. That's where the morale is going down.

• 2015

We see a bonus given to a higher echelon. It wasn't only to DND people; it was to higher echelons in all government agencies. It was like a kick in the head. If we could work it out so that we could all have a little piece of that extra pie, it would be nice. Your idea, sir, from the warrant officer earlier, how did that go again?

Mr. Bob Wood: I wrote some notes down here when he was talking about the performance bonus. Is that what you're saying?

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Yes, a performance bonus.

Mr. Bob Wood: We got into the conversation about corporals. I mean, it could be anybody. When I said that, I meant all ranks. But he was using corporal as an example. I was asking him about what we could do or could look at to maybe get some more money into people's pockets, again to make them realize that we appreciate what they're doing—how we could go about it. He suggested, and this is his idea, that we have....

There are four incentive levels for a corporal. After they get to the fourth incentive level there are no more promotions. If they get to be a master corporal they might get $100 extra a month—I guess that was it, or per pay—and they're still stuck at the four incentive levels. His idea was, and I thought it was a fairly good one, that maybe there should be a trade exam in whatever field you're in, whether you're a rigger, fitter, safety equipment—I guess this gentleman said they're all matched into one now—

Cpl Heather McRitchie: We're all one.

Mr. Bob Wood: But have a trade exam after a year where a person could write an exam on their trade. If they received a passing grade—85%, 90% or whatever—they would be allowed a performance bonus of x amount of dollars.

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Why would it have to be an exam? Why could it not be on our own merit?

Mr. Bob Wood: It could be. This was his idea.

Cpl Heather McRitchie: A lot of people are good technicians. They're good technicians, but if you put a test in front of them they can't write it. They freeze right up. I'm one of them.

Why not go on merit of their own PERs?

Mr. Bob Wood: Why not?

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Take the limits off the PERs, the number limits, and have them written as that.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, but PERs done in an honest way. I think we heard Bev Warden tell us that a friend of hers came up with a great idea. It probably saved some money, it probably helped out repairs of helicopters, and still it wasn't mentioned on her—

Cpl Heather McRitchie: As I was saying, they were playing to the numbers, the limits. There are so many, a percentage in the C level, a percentage in the B level, and there's a certain percentage in the F level, let's say. I'm going backwards.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, that's fine.

Cpl Heather McRitchie: They're only allowed so many people. Finally, this year they've taken that limit off and people are now going to be able to stand on their merit. If a person is working to a D standard, they're working to a D standard. If they're working to a DE standard, then they're a DE standard. There's no limitation on that.

Mr. Bob Wood: What is the highest standard?

Cpl Heather McRitchie: G.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, it could be done that way.

Cpl Heather McRitchie: That's basically all I have to say.

Mr. Bob Wood: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Leon, did you have a question?

Mr. Leon Benoit: Corporal, one of your first comments was that pay increases or paid bonuses to the upper echelons was like a kick in the head.

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Yes.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I want you to explain just exactly what you mean.

• 2020

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Well, in our trade, basically—I can only go for our example or in the AVN world, AVS world—my trade has expanded to five trades now. We have gone through the courses. We are working hard on trying to learn all the other aspects of the aircraft, not only the instrument's electrical. We're going through the airframe, we're going through the aero-engine, safety systems, and also—what's the other trade?—armament.

We're going through all this, we're learning it, and we're working hard. Then we find out that General So-and-So has gotten a $4,000 bonus. What have we gotten in the last seven years? Nothing. Just more work, more responsibility. It was like a big kick in the head, sir.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I've had it explained to me that the leaders in the upper ranks really deserve these increases, to put them on par with what they would be getting if they were in the private sector as a leader in a corporation or some such thing. How do you respond to that?

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Well, yes, maybe they do deserve the bonuses, but so does everybody. It's just a basic share-the-wealth. Why give it to just one person, when it could have been broken down and said that everybody across the board has a $500 pay bonus this year?

Mr. Leon Benoit: You've already said that it's like a kick in the head for them to get these increases when you are not, in spite of the fact that you are learning all these new speciality areas.

What would it do for the way you and the people you work with view leadership if the men and women in the upper ranks were to say, “No, we're not going to take this pay increase or this pay bonus, not that we don't deserve it, because we think we do, but if the men and women we are leading aren't going to get it, then we're just not going to take it”?

Cpl Heather McRitchie: I would stand behind that man 120% if he said that. I would have a lot of respect for somebody who'd stand up and say something like that, who would say, “No, if my people don't get it, then I don't want it”. It would just make a lot of sense to me.

That's more the way leadership should be run. It's the old school of leadership: take care of my men first before you take care of me.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Do you think that's lost in the forces now?

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Very basically, yes, sir. There is no doubt in my mind that the “take care of me” attitude comes first, before going on to the “take care of my men first”.

Don't get me wrong. It's not 100% across the board, but it's a general feeling that everybody has.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'm just trying to get a general feeling from you. I understand that.

Okay, thank you.

Cpl Heather McRitchie: Okay. Any more questions?

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Elaine Black.

Ms. Elaine Black (Individual Presentation): Good evening, and thank you so much for giving us the opportunity to speak to you.

I have two points to make. The first one is on the chaplaincy within the Canadian military. We have had a downsizing of our chaplaincy, as in everything else concerning the military in the last few years. As a military spouse, I feel our chaplaincy is extremely important to the community of the military.

I think we have to realize that we are somewhat different in that we are of the transient nature, and that it is good to have our own chapels on our bases, to worship in the community of the military. So I would encourage you to do what you can to not downgrade the chaplaincy any further.

• 2025

My second point is this. As a wife of a senior non-commissioned officer, when I first married into the military 22 years ago, I can honestly say that I didn't have much regard for the military. I encouraged my husband to get out of the military many times.

But over the years, I came to the point where I truly respect the work and the people of the military across Canada. I am now very proud to say that my husband is with the Canadian Forces.

One thing I never did get to understand in those 22 years was the separation between officers and NCMs. To this day, I still don't understand that separation.

A gentleman tonight remarked that he didn't feel the officers should be going to the Yukon Galley to eat. Also, speaking again about PMQs, he said that maybe there should be a separation between the officers and the NCMs.

I still do, after 22 years, have difficulty with that separation. I am told many times that I don't understand. That's quite possible, but I believe you can still respect someone, very much so, if you eat or live beside him. You can still very much respect his position within the ranks.

My husband, in the last couple of years, has had difficulty with what is happening with his men. I hope he has told you himself today or yesterday that he finds it very difficult to see the morale within the NCMs. We have had many evenings of duress over it.

That's not to say that the people who work for him in the squadron he belongs to are not encouraged, acclaimed, and applauded, because I believe they are. They work for an excellent commanding officer.

But it's beyond that, where there are no pay increases or promotions. It's beyond that as well. It's also the PR that's given to these men. My husband would tell you that probably 98% of his people are excellent technicians, yet they don't feel that they are appreciated, not from maybe their bosses, but within the Department of National Defence and the country.

I think we can do something about that. We know that the media has been putting down the military very much so in the last few years, but I believe we can offset that by doing a lot of PR about the good things our technicians do in each and every respective trade or squadron. I think there are some things we can do to help these people feel they really are appreciated by the people of Canada and for the work they do.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: Elaine, I heard about you today, so it's nice to meet you. I had an opportunity to talk with your husband today as a matter of fact. He expressed some of the same concerns that you just did, but he also told me about you. You apparently do a fair amount of volunteer work, and you were just in North Bay on the weekend, right?

Ms. Elaine Black: Yes, I heard you say you were from North Bay. It's a beautiful spot.

• 2030

Mr. Bob Wood: You were up there giving a couple of speeches, I guess, inspirational speeches, or helping out. Could you elaborate on some of the volunteer work you do around the province? I was under the impression that you travelled around from time to time, and gave talks. Is that right?

Ms. Elaine Black: “Gave talks”?

Mr. Bob Wood: This was your husband.

Ms. Elaine Black: He was puffing me up, was he?

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, he was, and good for him.

Ms. Elaine Black: I belong to the Catholic Women's League of Canada, which 35 years ago developed the military as the eleventh province within the national organization. In that province, I sit as the first vice-president of the Military Ordinariate Council. On our bases we have leagues and councils across the country, and I have gone to do some training of the ladies.

Mr. Bob Wood: Most of the chapels now are ecumenical chapels, I guess, and a lot of the churches have been torn down. I know one in North Bay has been torn down, which was a sad state of affairs. I also know there's a new ecumenical chapel here. How is that working out?

Ms. Elaine Black: We call it a “combined”, because it's two faiths combined in the same building, but we're not ecumenical in that our services will not be ecumenical. There will be a Catholic service and there will be a Protestant service. It's not one service for all faiths.

We are not into that chapel yet. We do have a little leak problem, so we'll probably not be into it for another two or three weeks.

Mr. Bob Wood: Are the padres here on contract? I know in North Bay they are. A lot of them are out of the air force or the armed forces, and now they're under contract. Is that the same here?

Ms. Elaine Black: To my knowledge, we have two full-time chaplains on the RC side and one pastoral associate. I believe they're not on contract, but I would think they're regular members of the force, yes.

We're a big base here, of course.

Mr. Bob Wood: Okay. Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Elaine, you made a comment that you believe men and women in the forces aren't appreciated both within our country and DND. Why do you think that is? Because it hasn't always been like that.

Ms. Elaine Black: I'm not sure why it is. I don't want to judge something that I really don't know of, but I don't like to hear some comments, which I hear both here and out and about, that it's somewhat demeaning because you're a NCM as opposed to an officer.

I guess civilians...you know, we don't live in that kind of a world. We don't live on city streets where, in the department of education, let's say, a principal can live next to a teacher. They can eat in the same place. They can play squash together.

So we're not used to this separation. I don't know if I'll ever get used to that. I don't like to hear comments that make me feel that one group is better than the other. We just have different jobs to do.

Mr. Leon Benoit: To get back to the question, why do you think the military isn't viewed in a very positive way by the country, by the citizens of Canada, by the general population out there?

Ms. Elaine Black: We've had an awful lot of negative press in the last few years. Again, I think it's an education thing. When people know about the good work of the military, when they know that, when they are connected with the military for whatever purpose, they really appreciate what is done within the military. But a great percentage of people are not educated to that, so they go with what they hear in the media. Of course, you know it has not been very favourable in the last while, even though such projects as the ice storm and the Winnipeg River rally have been so positive. There's that lasting feeling of Somalia and all of the above.

• 2035

Mr. Leon Benoit: Do you think it would have much of an impact if our Prime Minister were to stand up and publicly say Canada needs a strong military, the very future of the sovereignty of our country could depend on Canada having a strong military, and the men and women in our forces are doing a good job? What kind of an impact do you think that would have on the men and women in the forces?

In the United States we see, on a regular basis, the President stand up and say the future of America depends on having a strong military. Whenever the American forces are somewhere in the world trying to deal with a situation, the President stands up and says “The men and women in our forces are the best in the world and they're out there putting their lives on the line for us.”

But in Canada, to my knowledge, prime ministers for the last 30 years just haven't done that. I honestly cannot remember a time when a prime minister in Canada did that.

Ms. Elaine Black: I'm talking about an entire package of PR work, from our Prime Minister down. Many things could make a difference in terms of public relations, definitely starting with him and then the Minister of National Defence.

I went to a wonderful ceremony last year at the Governor General's home where the Governor General spoke about the military in such a positive and wonderful light that you couldn't help but walk out of there feeling very proud to be a spouse or a military member. You're right, we really need that sort of thing, but not just a one-time shot. We need a continual pump-up of the military because we do great things.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Just one quick last comment.

You said at first you encouraged your husband to get out of the military. You just didn't want any part of it. You didn't have the right positive image of the military. But as you got to know what was actually going on and what the people in the forces were like, you became very supportive, and you're now proud to say your husband is a member of the Canadian Armed Forces.

I just want to say that over the last five years and over the last few months, as I have gone from base to base, listening to people like you at meetings like this—and there have been quite a few of them now—I am really proud of what the men and women in the forces are doing. If more people could actually find out what kind of people—I've immensely enjoyed meeting people, meeting you and others who are in the forces—we have in the forces and how professional they are, in terms of carrying out their duties.... I don't think Canadians have any idea of what goes on in the Canadian Forces.

Ms. Elaine Black: I agree with you, and that's why I say the education of the people is really paramount. Thank you so much.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thank you very much.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Mr. Price.

Mr. David Price: I guess several of my questions were already answered, as they were the same as the questions Mr. Wood put forward.

• 2040

I saw from the beginning that you obviously are quite involved in the church. You've just built a new chapel here. Is that because there is a larger demand? Do you find an increased involvement in the church and church groups? Are there more groups out there now? Over the years you've been in the military, have you found an increase in that?

Ms. Elaine Black: I believe the reason for the building of the new chapel is that our chaplaincy has combined. Our command chaplain is now a Protestant, and he is over all of the chaplains, Protestant and RC, and next year there will be a change, and for two years the command chaplain will be a Catholic. So there's been a combination, a joining together, of the faiths, so maybe consequently the joining together within the same building.

But of course there's also the fact that one of our chapels in particular was falling down around the people, and something had to be done. So rather than build two new chapels, we built one.

I am excited about that possibility of being within the same building—not sharing the same service, but being within the same building—because I do think we all are heading in the same direction. I hope we all get there together.

So your question was, do I see more involvement?

Mr. David Price: Yes, in groups, for instance, and do you see in this case the groups becoming more ecumenical, the groups themselves combining?

Ms. Elaine Black: Well, as you know, we're not in the same building yet, but I do see that we will join together in many activities. We have already started to do that. Anything that is not already set.... For instance, the Catholic Women's League will probably remain that way and the Women's Guild will probably remain that way, but we will come together, I hope, for many social functions, for many worshipping functions—

Mr. David Price: So you find there is some excitement towards their getting together like that?

Ms. Elaine Black: Oh, I am very excited about it, yes.

Mr. David Price: Over the years you've been in the military, have you found an increase in the interest and in the involvement in the groups and the church?

Ms. Elaine Black: We are some of the fortunate ones, my husband and I, that we weren't transferred around too many times, so I only have experience in Edmonton, Summerside, and Trenton in our 22 years. The Roman Catholic side at least was very active in all three bases I belonged to, and here in Trenton, yes, we have a very active church and our groups are thriving. I can't say whether it would be—

Mr. David Price: Do you find part of it is people looking for more support, or is it wanting to get involved?

Ms. Elaine Black: I think there's a natural need there to.... We won't get into talking about faith, but there's certainly a fellowship and support there, especially because in some cases our spouses are away on deployment or whatever. There is a sense of support at the church from your fellow parishioners and from your padres, and that's extremely important.

Mr. David Price: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Denis Paquet.

[Translation]

Cpl. Denis Paquet: I'd like to make a few comments on the low morale that we have currently identified in the Forces. First of all, I think that people should be attached to a unit. When an individual is attached to a unit, he's proud to say where he works and what he does. When there are constant cutbacks in personnel, we mustn't be shy about stating that the government has contributed to this as well. We must not be shy about stating this.

We were asked to describe how we did our work, to set out the precise steps that we followed. We did this; we produced a neat report on all of this in writing. We gave it to our superiors and it went to the top. All of a sudden, the government said that it would combine everything, the AVN, the AVS, etc. It then told our superiors to make cuts.

• 2045

Why were the cuts made? Because steps could be skipped. This resulted in an excess of personnel: AVNs, AVSs. There are approximately 300 AVNs. In other words, it is because we described our duties very precisely, and all the steps that we followed in the Canadian Armed Forces, that our positions were cut. We shot ourselves in the foot. We undermined ourselves by agreeing to do good work for the government.

It is like giving someone a sheet, an F9000, for example, asking him to describe his tasks, step by step. He does so, and the next day the caretaker is told that he will assemble the engine or work on the aircraft. He is told there is no problem, because he merely has to follow the instructions on the sheet. The sheet describes all the steps.

You have to remember that experience is developed, you cannot buy it. You could not say to the minister tomorrow morning that he will become an STS, or a secretary or a caretaker, or that he will do all of that at the same time. It's impossible. It takes time. It takes experience. It takes analyses, a great deal of patience and training.

To have the training, you cannot reduce the budget, because then nothing will work anymore. You also have to remember that some public servants work in our settings and that for each military member, there are three civilians. There is the CE, and everybody who works in areas related to the military field. Let's not kid ourselves. And so, in the long term, through the cuts, we are suffering the consequences.

The second point concerns the exams that were mentioned. If you get 85%... As far as I'm concerned, as a technician, when the aircraft is out on the flight line and has been tested, you have passed your exam if the aircraft...

[Editor's note: Inaudible] This is a great success for the technician, who is proud of himself. I would like to say that as a Canadian, when an aircraft goes out and flies in the air, I am proud. It has gone off on its mission and there was no breakdown. If it has to be repaired, we send out the MRP personnel. They are proud to go and repair our aircraft and bring it back. We have passed our exam.

When the pilot is in the air and is flying either a combat aircraft or a helicopter, we say that it is thanks to us, the technicians. There may be differences between people. We should not put everyone on the same footing; pilots are pilots and air crew are air crew. You have to remember that people are individuals. The guy up there has his job to do. He does it. If he thinks he's hot shit—excuse the expression—it's because that's the way he is.

But you must not think that everybody is like that. The Colonel can sit down at the same table with me; I will talk to him, but I know that he is the Colonel, that he's my boss. You have to be able to say that somebody is your boss, your superior. You have to be able to admit it. He is my superior and that's it. Everybody cannot be valet and king at the same time. Each has his space. A lot has been said on the subject. It's true. If I am a farmer who sells his cattle at the auction, and I'm a good seller, I swear to you that I will be able to unload sick cows.

The Chairman: Thank you.

[English]

Lieutenant Mark McCullins.

Lieutenant Mark McCullins (Individual Presentation): Good evening.

Some of the talk tonight has centred on the issue of leadership in the Canadian Forces, and I'd like to take a couple of minutes of your time to pass on an observation from my experience as an officer in the forces and to give you two brief illustrations from my life in the forces as to why I perceive this as a problem.

The coin of leadership has two sides to it, responsibility and authority, and a very delicate balance must exist between these two sides. Obviously if one has a lot of authority but not the responsibility to see it exercised correctly, we leave ourselves open to abuse of power. On the other side, if one has a responsibility for people or things and not the authority to deal with them, we leave ourselves in a situation that is much less than ideal.

I'll give you two brief examples of this. First of all, I'm a pilot with 435 Squadron in Winnipeg. I received my wings approximately a year ago and have waited a year to get my conversion on the C-130 Hercules. Basically to the taxpayer I represent $1.5 million in flight education spent a fiscal year too early.

• 2050

My supervisor is the pilot leader—note the term “leader”—at 435. Nobody would dispute that the pilot leader is responsible for my morale, my well-being, and my development as an officer. However, while I waited this year getting shuffled three months at a time from course to course and my wedding got moved twice, which of course doesn't make for an ideal situation at home and doesn't give my wife a very good impression of the military, my supervisor did not have the authority to examine alternate training measures and an alternate posting for me, nor another way of getting things done.

An example that puts me on the other end of the spectrum was when I was in my fourth year at the Royal Military College learning to be an officer. I was a cadet squadron leader responsible for my squadron of 120 officer cadets. But while being responsible for their well-being, I did not have the authority to excuse one of my cadets from parade because he had sprained his ankle and could not see a doctor over the weekend.

This, I think, illustrates a problem that is endemic in the Canadian Forces today as we restructure: the balance between responsibility and authority in our leadership has been ignored and overlooked in some cases. I think if you want to get to the heart of many of the morale problems, we need to have leaders who are empowered to deal with the areas they are responsible for. Thank you.

The Chairman: Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit: You said your wedding was postponed. Just explain that.

Lt Mark McCullins: This situation relates very closely to the pilot attrition problem we've been talking to in that there's been a real problem getting instructors who will stay at the operational conversion unit here. Of course they are you're most experienced people; they are the most marketable.

When I showed up at the squadron last Christmas, a year ago, I was slated to go on the April operational conversion unit. My wedding was scheduled for July, which was not going to be a problem. However, we got a phone call about two weeks later at the squadron that said, we're sorry, we have no instructors; the April operational conversion unit has been cancelled and you're now going to go in June. Therefore, smack in the middle of where we had planned my wedding, I was going to be overseas at the time.

So we sat down with my supervisor and he said, here's when we think you're going to be on course. So I planned my wedding around that. A month later we got a phone call. The course had been moved again, right on top of where we put my wedding, so we moved it back. As it was, none of it mattered because my course got rolled another six months and I waited a year on the ground in Winnipeg to go there.

So because of a lack of information flowing back and forth, and because of a lack of empowerment at the local level to have something done about it, it basically left us in a less than ideal situation. I hope that answers your question.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Your wife's not in the military?

Lt Mark McCullins: No, she's not.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I wonder what her view of the military life is.

Lt Mark McCullins: I heard about it last night to a great extent. As you may know, 435 Squadron is currently in Kuwait doing air-to-air refuelling. Of the pilots at the squadron when I left because of attrition, we had three air-to-air qualified first officers in the country. Because I waited so long to come on course and there's such a shortage now, I will be going air-to-air. Having spent three months here in Trenton, I got a phone call from my squadron two days ago to tell me to report to the hospital for a screening to go to Kuwait for another three months as soon as we get back. As you can imagine, my new wife was not thrilled to hear that I was going to be away for the first seven of the nine months of our marriage.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Have you heard of other situations where weddings have been postponed due to that type of rescheduling?

Lt Mark McCullins: I can't say I have.

Mr. Leon Benoit: It sounds like something that would be very unusual.

A voice: We just eloped and forgot about the whole thing. It's easier that way.

• 2055

Lt Mark McCullins: What the situation does, without empowering your local supervisors or giving them the information and the authority to do their job, is that it winds up with people's lives on hold for indefinite periods. I was a trained pilot, yet I sat and waited for a year to be able to do my job.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Having to change the date of a wedding due to a rescheduling problem doesn't seem to me to be an insignificant thing, really.

Lt Mark McCullins: Well, it gets better than that. When it came time to book my honeymoon—we had planned that nine months in advance—I sat down with my supervisor. To the best of our knowledge, we put it somewhere when I was not going to be on a course.

When I was told I would be on the course this January to get my operational category, we were informed that I needed to have a valid instrument rating to come on this course, which of course I didn't. I had waited for a year, so my qualification had expired.

The one course they could have put me on landed right when we had booked the honeymoon. There was another one slightly before that, but with no spots available. However, rather than put me on that one, it was suggested that maybe I should just take my honeymoon, get another course in the new year, and wait another three months before I could get my conversion on the C-130. That's because the person who was in charge of that was unable to create a spot on the course for me.

Now, it happened to work out. But that was more by chance than by good planning.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Thank you.

The Chairman: By the way, are you still married?

Lt Mark McCullins: At this point, yes, very happily.

The Chairman: Mr. Wood.

Mr. Bob Wood: Mark, did I hear you say that your supervisor didn't look at alternate postings for you while you waited?

Lt Mark McCullins: My supervisor would very much have liked to. We talked about it, but because of the way this was done, he did not have the authority as my supervisor to look into this. This of course falls with career managers and higher headquarters when you're in the training system like this.

Mr. Bob Wood: Did you have access to career managers in Winnipeg while you waited? Could you have done it?

Lt Mark McCullins: I'm supposed to do that through my supervisor.

Mr. Bob Wood: Okay.

Lt Mark McCullins: However, the impression I got from the career manager was that his hands were tied. If there has been any problem in my career that I've encountered with leadership, it's not that people's intentions are bad. In fact, when I speak with my squadron leader, the wing commander, and even the chief of the air staff, you can see in their faces and in their words that they really would like to make things better. The impression I get is that their hands are tied in that they cannot do this.

Mr. Bob Wood: Well, with that much authority, you would think they could.

Lt Mark McCullins: You used the word “authority”. I see that they certainly have the responsibility for it on paper.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes.

Lt Mark McCullins: But when a wing commander or squadron leader does not have the power to keep his pilots and post them to be in charge of their training, he obviously does not have the authority commensurate with the responsibility. If he doesn't have that, how can he do his job? How can he keep morale?

Mr. Bob Wood: Okay, thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Captain Mike Blow.

Captain Mike Blow (Individual Presentation): I have two points. First of all, I'd like to mention that, probably like a few other members in the audience here, I did work my way up through the ranks. I started as a private; I'm now a captain.

As for the performance bonuses, or whatever you want to call them, first off, I don't agree with the military being treated like a corporation. If you're going to treat it like a corporation, then apply that to every member of the Canadian Forces.

Say you want to do a corporate performance bonus or whatever. I'll take my section as an example. I'm the fire chief. My firefighters are not paid the same as their DND civilian counterparts working in Halifax or Esquimalt. I am not paid the same as the fire chief in Halifax or Esquimalt. I find that wrong. I'm paid on the rank I hold, not on the job I do. I think that's unfair across the military.

If you're going to pay people and treat it as a corporate business, then pay those people in accordance with the wage their civilian counterparts are getting, not just whether they're a chief executive, pilot, or whatever? Without the support people, those pilots don't fly and the generals don't have people to do their job.

• 2100

The second point I'd like to bring up is the leave policy. The NDHQ leave policy must have been made by day workers, because it does not take into account shift-worker responsibilities. I have 50 people in my fire hall who work shifts. Every piece of military training they do that is not commensurate with the job, or even the stuff that has to be done with the job, is done on their time off.

A civilian fire fighter gets paid overtime. He gets compensated for that time off. My people don't, because I have to fulfil that 25 days leave a year, leave that they have to take. I do not have any leeway to give them ETOs or time off, or bonuses to pay them for that time. We're looking at a lot of days—I would say on average about 25 to 30 days per year, at least, when these people have to do this training. I'm not talking about general military training. I'm talking about SHARP training, or Flight Plan 97; all this stuff they have to do on their days off. How can I compensate them? I can't.

I think the leave policy should be looked at. I accumulated leave when I was posted to sea and all that. I had no choice. If I had taken my leave, I would have been.... Why are we punishing people because they're shift workers or whatever? They have to take that leave and we're not compensating them for the extra time.

The Chairman: Bob, you had a question.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes. We've heard a lot about the leave policy, Captain. How long has that leave policy been in effect? Has that been there quite awhile?

Capt Mike Blow: I believe this is the second year.

Mr. Bob Wood: So it has just started.

Capt Mike Blow: Yes. It was supposed to be a morale booster. If anything, it's had the opposite effect. I would personally like to get hold of the generals' leave passes in NDHQ and see whether these guys are taking their 25 days leave a year. Maybe they are, maybe they aren't. I don't know.

Mr. Bob Wood: I think you know the answer to that.

Capt Mike Blow: Oh, I know the answer to that. When I phone NDHQ, I can't get anybody in the last part of March because they're all on leave.

Mr. Bob Wood: Is that the permanent policy? They didn't do that just to try it out or as an experimental thing or anything like that, did they?

Capt Mike Blow: No, it came across because of the amount of accumulated leave. NDHQ policy is that for operational requirements you can accumulate up to five.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes.

Capt Mike Blow: The base policy is zero, and I blame nobody for that. I mean, it's a money thing and what money goes to pay accumulated leave cannot go to operational requirements. It's up to us. I have to say that my section has zeroed their leave for two years in a row, but at the cost of morale.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes.

Capt Mike Blow: At a cost of my people coming in at 8 a.m., or whenever their shift starts, going home wanting nothing else to do with the military after their time is up. I can't even get these guys to go to Christmas parties, because they want nothing to do with the military once their day is finished. These guys also, a lot of them, have two jobs. They have a part-time job outside to make ends meet.

Mr. Bob Wood: Please refresh me. Tell me how the old policy used to work. You could accumulate days, couldn't you?

Capt Mike Blow: I could accumulate.

Mr. Bob Wood: Up to how many? Was there a limit?

Capt Mike Blow: No.

Mr. Bob Wood: You could just accumulate days that you didn't take and then take them at your leisure or when you got out, is that right?

Capt Mike Blow: I could accumulate as many days as I wanted to during the year. Again, that was usually due to operations. If I couldn't take leave.... When I was working with two people, myself and another person, if that person was on leave, I couldn't take leave. If he was on a course, then I couldn't take leave.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes.

Capt Mike Blow: So I had to accumulate that leave. There was no set amount of leave that I could accumulate. I could accumulate 350 days if I wanted over a period of time. That leave was normally taken in a buy-out, I believe, at the end of your career.

Mr. Bob Wood: Was it because they thought people were abusing the system?

Capt Mike Blow: I don't know. Nobody asked me. Otherwise, I would probably have told them “I can't take leave when I'm six months at sea”.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes, kind of rough.

Capt Mike Blow: The thing is, when you come back.... I mean, how do we do it? I have a guy in Alert for six months. How the heck is he going to take 25 days of leave? When the guy gets out of Alert, he gets ten days of special leave for being in Alert. I now have to tell that guy, “Now you're going on day status you're going to take 10 days or 15 days of leave”. So I've lost that guy for basically a month. Who suffers? It is the guy he's supposed to replace now. As a result, I have to keep a senior NCO in that position who cannot take leave because this guy's taking leave.

• 2105

It's a lousy policy, and I think it has to be reviewed. It's good that you have to take holidays—I agree with that—but allow people to accumulate according to requirements or whatever.

Mr. Bob Wood: Yes—up to a portion, or maybe....

Capt Mike Blow: Well, there is a five-day portion, but unfortunately, again, economics dictate. If the wing commander does not have the budget to support 2,000 military members accumulating five days.... That's a lot of money. We're not talking just about corporals; we're talking about lieutenant colonels and all that, who make a lot of money, because it's based on their wages. As I said, I have no problem with that. I believe in operations first, but again, the point is, how do we compensate these guys for having to do stuff on their days off?

That's another point. I can't compensate. I can't give them ETOs. I have guys, as I said, to whom I owe 25 days of ETOs. I can't compensate them.

You tell a civilian that. First of all, he's going to say,“See my union guy. Where's my overtime, and when am I going to get my time off?” You have to give it to them in the civilian sector. We have no choice.

Mr. Bob Wood: In your section, are people able to take their 25 days, or are they losing it because they just can't work it in, or it just can't be accommodated?

Capt Mike Blow: If there is no money to pay for these people when they accumulate leave, I guess you could say they lose it. If they don't take 25 days, they're going to lose that 5 days' leave, because there's no money left in the pot to pay these guys. So, yes, they lose it.

Mr. Bob Wood: Thanks a lot, Captain.

The Chairman: Mr. Price.

Mr. David Price: You said you were the fire captain.

Capt Mike Blow: Yes.

Mr. David Price: I have a question on the privatization—ASD, in other words—of fire departments. I'm sure you must have been talking to some of your confrères about what's been going on and so on. Do you have any comments on that?

Capt Mike Blow: Again, it depends on the situation. We're looking at the military, and if you want to deploy firefighters to an austere base, like Sarajevo or some place like that, you aren't going to get civilians to go.

You have to have a cadre, I believe, of military firefighters. You have to have military firefighters on the ships. A ship is an operational unit. You're not going to get civilians sailing for six months—not unless you want to pay them an arm and a leg.

We are specialized in the sense that we are crash rescue here, but we're also structural. We're better trained than our civilian counterparts. In fact, I think any trade in the military is better trained than—

Mr. David Price: It is very specialized.

Capt Mike Blow: Yes. But they are not getting paid for it. If you want to talk about equal pay for equal work, start looking at the civilians—

Mr. David Price: I just want to get that on the record. I knew pretty well what you were going to say.

Capt Mike Blow: I'm open for more.

Mr. David Price: Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Capt Mike Blow: As I say, I would just like to reiterate that I have worked my way up through the ranks, so I think I know where these guys are coming from, and I know where the junior officers are coming from, too, and it stinks right now. It needs improvement, big time. Thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Mr. Klaus Knauer.

Corporal Klaus Knauer (Individual Presentation): I'm trying to sum up a 22-year career. I'm retiring in 25 days, rather than 16 days. I think our biggest problem in the Canadian Forces is in Ottawa—and not on the military side, not in Disney on the Rideau; we're talking about Parliament Hill.

Every time there is a budget cut, where do they start? With the military. We have no recourse but to follow. It's just like kicking your little brother in the behind, and he can't do a thing about it. Our leaders on top are generals, and so on down, right? They have to do their job.

Rations in the Yukon Lodge—there's a good example. The captain is pulling his hair out. He was mandated from on high that “You will charge this amount of money because of ASD” and all the rest of this stuff, and he has to do it. On the bottom, young privates that earn, I don't know, $1,600—they can't afford $400 a month rations. That's one part.

What else have I seen in the last 22 years? Our government has effectively ripped apart the Canadian military. Somalia, the Airborne—sorry, guys, I know we're not allowed to say Airborne any more here, but you destroy the morale. I'm army; I'm not air force. When that regiment was ripped apart, our government destroyed the morale of the Canadian Forces.

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The Airborne was something in the army that a lot of young soldiers would aspire to. I can remember going on pre-para courses with 120 guys. Out of those 120 guys, 30 were picked. We'd run ourselves into the ground for that. What did the government do because it was thinking more about money? It looks at us now as some big corporation. We're not. We're a service or an insurance, so if people are stranded they're taken care of. If there's an ice storm, 11,000 people can be mobilized to help. But our government puts all that aside and goes back to this issue of money.

If you drive a car, the cost is insurance. If we want to drive a country, the cost is the military. You can't put a dollar figure on that. It makes no sense. Our generals, our colonels.... Colonel Dumais has to deal with all the bellyaching and headaches his subordinates and his superiors give him. It's a political problem in Ottawa. It's not a morale problem in the forces. Give us a break. That's all I'm saying.

I'm out of here in 25 days, not because I want to go. It's because I'm sick and tired of politicians dictating to me what is right and what is wrong. Let the generals do a general's job.

Let's go back 50 years to Adolf Hitler under the Nazis. Who destroyed that system? It was a politician, not the generals. A politician destroyed what would have been an effective fighting force. That's all I have to say.

The Chairman: Are there any questions?

Thank you.

Mr. Vern Miller.

Corporal Vern Miller (Individual Presentation): Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.

I showed up around 7.30 p.m. I was a little late. Some of these things might have been covered.

One of the morale problems we have in the military is the lack of legal aid for privates, corporals, and master corporals. People at the lower end of the scale can't afford lawyers when they have some problems, i.e., divorce, impaired driving, etc.

I think it would be of benefit if the JAG people could pretend they were lawyers too and help people out at the lower end of the scale, because a lot of them can't afford to fight for their rights, even if they're perfectly within their rights. They can't afford a lawyer to go out and do these kinds of things.

It's a stab in the back when your wife takes off with Bozo, the clown, and takes everything with her but you can't afford to fight it. In fact, you can lose $10,000 in furniture, cars, and whatever. If she leaves while you're out of the country, you get it pretty heavy.

On housing, I'm sure people have brought it up 1,000 times already, but it really is the pits here. When I was married—notice the key word “was”—and my wife and I first got here, I'd just been promoted to corporal. We'll talk about this after. There was no housing here so we had to rent a house downtown for $750 a month because we had two dogs. It was an old house. None of the apartment buildings around like animals in them—mind you, I was allowed in, so what the heck—so we had to rent a house. The dogs needed a backyard to play in and for exercise. For $750 a month it wasn't very good, because on top of that I paid hydro, gas, water, sewage, and garbage. It just didn't cut it.

There are too many high-ranking, senior people over here in the Qs and I think that's a crock. They're making the bucks, so spend some of them.

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For the single quarters, there isn't enough storage space in there. You have rooms that look like sardine cans. You can't move in them. You don't want to throw this stuff away, because one day you're going to move on to something bigger and better.

The tours to Alert are six months long. You clear an extra $200 a month. That's it. If you go over to Cyprus, to Golan, or anywhere else, you're making decent money, and you can go anywhere. You can't come out of Alert for two or three weeks and take your spouse somewhere. You're stuck there for six months. Why? Because they know if they bring you out, you're not going back.

Guess where I'm going in two weeks.

In a previous trade, I used to be a radio operator, a field dog—you know, get out there and sleep in the trench and everything else, look through the glasses for someone you know isn't there because they're smart enough to be at home. I got a trade re-muster because I had problems with my hand. I couldn't high-speed type, which we had to be able to do for teletype messages.

I did everything else they wanted—climbed the tree, chased the antenna across the field, looked for the blind guy who wasn't there, all that fun stuff. Yet when it came down to it, they wouldn't promote me to corporal because I had a problem with my hand.

There were people who had medical files you could sink a battleship with, but they got promoted because they could do exactly what the trade specifications were—no more, no less. Some of them didn't go out to the field. We had a lot of problems with people's wives, or their husbands, phoning the padre, saying, “Oh, he can't go. Wah!”, with every excuse used, yet they were getting promoted.

In terms of the medical category they put me in, I was trying to get a re-muster. They said no, there were no re-musters.

The force reduction plan came up for the radio operators. I went to take it, and they decided they were going to go down to Rwanda. Well, they couldn't promote me, yet they could take me down to Rwanda.

If you've read the files, according to their doctrine, if you're on a medical category, you can't leave the country. Last time I checked, Rwanda was still in Africa. They decided I was good enough to take down there, but they couldn't promote me.

So when I was going to take the FRP, I told them no, thanks: they could take Rwanda and do what they wanted with it, but I was going to get out, and my member of Parliament would be talking to them, shortly after my lawyer did, for the screwing around they'd given me.

Well, that sure changed things. I was down in Africa, I got promoted to corporal, and I got a trade re-muster.

You know what they were offering me before? Here's a man with a bad hand, who can't type because of finger dexterity problems, yet he can go out and play with explosives with the engineers. They wanted me to join the infantry. They were picking all the combat trades they knew I couldn't do. It was either take these or fail off their courses and then get booted out.

You see, they didn't want to look at it in that aspect. That's another reason morale is bad. You go for the Privacy Act to get your documents—medical documents, your personnel files, your UERs, or anything like that.

When I finally got to see my UER, before I got my trade reassignment, it was about an inch thick. Every squadron had this, “Oh, he can't type. He's no good to us. He should have been kicked out.” When they look at me now, they tell me they have guys worse than me, but because of the human rights division coming in, they can't do a thing with them. They have people in medical categories, in all different trades, filling positions they shouldn't be in. There is too much politics involved.

So-and-So, the good sergeant here, has been in for 30 years—he goes around in a wheelchair or whatever—but they keep him around because he's part of the old boy network, the political spectrum.

It's the pits. You can't do a thing with it. You're stuck.

Again, through the Privacy Act, it took two to three months to get the documents I wanted. I was going to do a redress on my corporals. It takes so long to get everything done. It's “follow the chain, follow the chain”. Well, when somebody's missing out of the chain, or it's 30 days for this and another 15 for that, and 20 days for this, then it just doesn't cut it. By the time your case is there, you've gone, or done something else.

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I was down in Africa two Christmases ago and the operation, what we were doing, was supporting the World Food Programme and different programs like that, getting supplies into the refugee camps and that, and everything was going pretty good there. But the only problem was they kept us down there a lot longer than they needed. By that I mean World Food Programme, UNHCR, all these different food programs, had gone home for Christmas, but Ottawa, in their ultimate wisdom, instead of bringing our soldiers back for Christmas, decided to keep us all down there until December 31. Happy New Year. It doesn't cut it. Go there, do the job, get the guys out. This costs people their marriages and everything else.

When they post people from bases, with the new technologies nowadays, a lot of people—not just the wives, the husbands—are up on things. They have excellent jobs. You're taken. You're uprooted. You go to a new posting. There are no jobs around here. Trenton is a town of 16,500, and I don't know how many of that is military and their spouses. What do you do? There are no jobs; there is no work around. A lot of times two members of a family have to have an income to get by, and you're not getting by on this.

We have new GORE-TEX clothing here for the army guys. Their work dress is now combats, green. Apparently there is a policy out that you can't mix the blue GORE-TEX with the green stuff, even though we're not sitting out trying to hide in the trees somewhere. I personally can't see a problem with this. The new GORE-TEX is a lot better than the other stuff we had. It keeps you warm and dry.

The forces are reducing right now, and now they expect Joe Henry over here to do three people's jobs instead of two, but he's still getting the same pay, for the one person, and that's a big, sore issue with a lot of people.

As far as leave goes, they have the leave travel allowance for single members. Once a year they give you a certain amount of money. They knock off the first 500 miles, or 805 kilometres, or whatever it is, to travel to wherever you're from or your nearest family member.

I'm from northern B.C. It depends on when I can book, what's going on, and that. It can cost me up to $1,500 to go home. They may pay up to 80% of that—maybe. They take their estimate by road miles, so sometimes I can end up paying quite a bit of money. For me, it's not so bad. I've been a single guy, but for a private who has a family, and wherever, he's not making a lot of money. He can't afford this stuff.

That's all I have.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Captain André Gagnon.

Captain André Gagnon (Individual Presentation): Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome.

I would like to do a bit of a hodgepodge. I came here to listen, and I heard a couple of comments that twitched my body. I'd like to answer to them.

One has to do with probably echoing some of the comments, since I put my name on the list, that have to do with leadership. As we say in French, “Il n'y a pas de fumée sans feu.”

Obviously there is a problem up there. Not all of us at the bottom can say there is a problem when there is no problem. But the problem might be compounded by the fact that.... I've been in the system for 26 years. I started with over 100,000 people, and if I remember my officer cadet course well, there were all the roles and the white paper. Now we're down to 60,000. The last time I read the white paper on defence, it's still the same for all that are there. You cannot skin somebody to the bone and then try to get the bone and have something working. It's not going to work.

Our senior officers are in dire straits to do all the jobs they're told to do, and we're there to do the jobs the government tells us to do, but eventually somebody up there is going to have to wake up and say either we cut some roles from that damned white paper or we give the damn tools to do the job—one of the two.

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The other one that somebody is going to have to wake up to is the famous ASD. It's really nice to contract out to people, because they can come in and charge a low price, then we get rid of our capabilities and they can charge whatever they want, so there's less money in the DND budget to pay more for the civilian contractor, and we're stuck with the high price. ASD is not.... I defy you to phone Air Canada Limited over the Atlantic the next time you need air transport and say, “By the way, you're not going to England; you're going to Rwanda”, and have the guy turn. We do that regularly in our job.

The other point I'd like to touch upon is this. People who know me know I'm an air navigator. I work with the pilots. I am paid as a general service officer. Yes, our pilots deserve more money, because they are competing with the market, but I'd like to point out what was said a bit earlier. If you want to take the law of supply and demand, that's really good, but you have to remember, in 1980, when the companies were firing people, I never saw one pilot ask for a reduction in pay, and yet there was nobody out there hiring.

If they want to go for a bonus and get extra money to stay in, the better for them, but they have to realize that in an aircraft, a CC-130 Hercules, there are five crew members, and we do the same job and we have the same hours. It's really nice for them to get their money, but as far as I know, we're all doing the same job and we're all the same company. So if you want to get the extra money, go for it, but think about the rest of us too.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Mr. Steve Panasky.

Mr. Steve Panasky (Individual Presentation): Good evening.

First of all, some years ago, in the years of the housing crisis, when the price of housing got very high, the military came out with a thing called triple A, and I believe it's still in effect to this day. I don't know if you've heard about this, but triple A is not Alcoholics Anonymous Association; it's accommodation assistance allowance.

I'll just give you a little scenario so you can see what I'm talking about. Just imagine for a moment that you and I are in the military, we earn the same pay, we're the same rank, and we're both transferred from Trenton to Ottawa. We both have $30,000 of equity. You decide to buy a house; I decide to rent a house. I take my $30,000 and invest it; you take yours and put it in your house. I get triple A; you don't. What do you think about that? It's not a very fair system. Furthermore, I can live in a PMQ in Ottawa and get triple A. You live in your own home and you won't get triple A.

On top of that, if you're living in Ottawa—and any of you right up there on the panel will know this—housing prices in Ottawa and the cost of living in Ottawa are quite high, regardless of whether you rent or own your home, taxes alone. Fortunately, when I lived there, I got triple A, but I never thought it was a fair thing.

Second, a lot of people talked about leadership here, and to some degree I have to agree with what they said. However, if you look at DND's structure, we're set up with an org chart. We have the big guy on top, whoever he might be, or she, and below them it just keeps going down in little boxes with individuals in those boxes, and you get down to the private at the bottom, and it gets bigger as it goes. You think about that and you think of the big guy up there; he pulls the strings and the boxes move.

Well, when I think about an org chart, I think you should flip it over. You should put the leader at the bottom. He's there to support us. If he supports us, he won't have to worry about his promotions or where he's going.

Third and last of all, something was said earlier about doing board exams, trade exams. Where are you going to get the people and the time to do it? Right now there's too much work and not enough people. Are you going to give us more people to take the time to do these exams? Right now, I don't think so.

That's it.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Mr. David Beck.

Mr. David Beck (Individual Presentation): Good evening. I have a few points.

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In reference to the testing for people in trades to take, with all the cutbacks, I don't think that will be very feasible, because you have so many people who are doing out-of-trade jobs. How can you rate someone on their trade when they're out doing some other guy's job because they're short-staffed somewhere? In my trade, we have people from other bases working on networks, working at ADP shops fixing computers, working in com centres, working switchboards, and each base is different. You'd have a really hard time getting a trade test for any particular trade. There are a lot of trades like that in the Canadian Forces. I'm a tel-op, but I'm doing a tech's trade, or I'm a tech, but I'm doing an operator's trade. That's one thing you'd have to look into.

The other thing is in reference to all the trade combinings. I'd like to see the higher-up people in DND go out to Air Canada and grab some union guy and say, “Okay, you're working on this plane engine, but now we want you to fix the electronics, the air frame, and all the safety system stuff, but hey, we're not giving you more money for it”, or say to an admin clerk, a guy at the corporation, “Okay, you're looking after 4,000 people's files, but by the way, you're now going to be looking after the pay, but with no more money for it”. The DND is like a manager's dream in the civilian world. Whew! You have it made.

The third point I'd like to make is about an experience I had myself in Washington. In reference to the politicians having to treat us better and inform the public of what's going on with us, I was in Washington with the Prime Minister's tour, and I was downstairs talking to one of the secretaries. The Prime Minister came along, shook my hand, and said, “Hi, are you going to the party at the White House across the street?”, and the secretary said, “No, this is Corporal Beck from the DND”. As soon as she said that, he pulled his hand away from mine, turned around, and walked away. He didn't say another word. You're left standing there thinking, “Oh, I'm proud to work for you, sir”. Stuff like that just makes the morale so high. It is really low in the military right now.

Those are my points. That's all I have to say.

The Chairman: Thank you very much.

Ladies and gentlemen, we've reached the end of our speakers. I just wanted to thank each and every one of you for coming out this evening, for your suggestions, and for your input in helping us with the writing of our report.

I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Colonel Dumais and his staff for their hospitality and for everything that was done to facilitate our stay here today.

Again, thanks to everyone for coming out. We will be sending you a copy of our report.

Thank you very much. Good night.